LIFE WITH BEVERLY: Story 5: At Last, My Loves Have Come Along
by mabb5
Summary: The time for motherhood is approaching. Both Beverly and Jean-Luc are dealing with this momentous event together, and in their own ways. Meanwhile, Lwaxana, Guinan and everyone else waits with anxious breath, thereby driving Beverly batty. But it is Kate Pulaski who is driving Jean-Luc batty.
1. Chapter 1

_**A.N.: **__First, I want to thank everyone for their kind reviews for this series. And the fact that you keep coming back for more. When I realized that tens of thousands of visitors have read ATTACHED-MEANT and the DE-TACHED sequel series, I am overwhelmed. It's good to know that there are TNG fans still out there._

_Next, people have sort of wondered why I am writing these stories. Certainly, there are thousands of love stories, ship in danger stories, Borg battle stories, Lore and Data stories, Klingon honor stories, and how many ways can we crash the ship stories out there. But with the exception of a few other authors, no one was writing the daily life kind of stories. Since I feel that I don't write the battle stories that well, I thought that for now, I'd concentrate on the lives of my favorite characters. Their stories should continue on beyond the point of 'happily ever after'._

_**In order not to be completely confused about how things have come to this point, it is advisable that you read the novel "Attached Meant" and its sequels, "De-Tached: Story One, Story Two, Story Three and Story Four: Life With Beverly".**_

Of course, if you'd rather just go with the flow without reading my earlier efforts, that's okay too. The situation isn't that difficult to understand.

_**Synopsis**__: Jean-Luc and Beverly are happily married and living in the house that he'd inherited from his Aunt Adele in San Francisco. Picard is the Superintendent of Starfleet Academy now. Beverly was the temporary head of Starfleet Medical, though she's now the admiral in charge of creating the Federation's new Hospital Fleet. Oh, and Beverly is pregnant. And thanks to an aftereffect of their psychic bond from the KesPrytt incident, Jean-Luc can feel everything that Beverly feels during their pregnancy including morning sickness. Because Beverly sensed that her unborn twins were psychically 'different', she asked Deanna for help. Deanna sent Lwaxana who has now moved in - temporarily - with the Picards. Guinan shows up too, to be a temporary nanny. Both ladies are going to teach Jean-Luc and Beverly how to deal with or communicate with their twins, in utero. Also, Lwaxana has married the head of Starfleet, Fleet Admiral Winston Holt Wiley, and he is currently staying at Picard House too since his own home is being decorated by Lwaxana and it is not yet ready for them to move back home (if ever). Beverly is in her last trimester, and is now on maternity leave, awaiting the arrival of her twins._

All of this is set in an alternate universe that takes place immediately after the episode "Attached". Therefore, nothing that happened after "Attached" exists in this a/u. Riker is now captain of the Enterprise. Dr. Selar is Riker's CMO. Robert and Rene are alive. Admiral Nechayev is a good guy, Etc.

_**All the usual disclaimers apply. STAR TREK is Paramount's property. But fan fiction is fandom's playground. **_

_**This author would greatly appreciate any reviews or comments.**_

_**De-Tached: Story 5: Life with Beverly**_

_**Chapter 1: **_

"_**At Last…" **_

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

"I feel and look like a watched pot," Beverly grumbled. Her complaint was cut short as Jean-Luc found a particularly stiff muscle on her neck and massaged it firmly. "Oh, that's heavenly…" she sighed with contentment. "I do so love your hands on my body…" She leaned back into his chest as she relaxed some more on her favorite chaise lounge in their library.

"You looked like a watched pot?" Jean-Luc picked up the conversation. "Teapot or kettle?"

She elbowed him for that remark, even as she continued to enjoy his tender touch. "Everyone is staring at me, expecting me to bubble forth and produce twins, and I'm not even due yet!"

Jean-Luc glanced down at the size of her abdomen, and silently wondered about that. On paper, Beverly was due to give birth in a little more than three weeks. But he had noticed that everyone from Guinan to Lwaxana to Dr. Bolt seemed to think that the arrival of his son and daughter would be much sooner than that. He worked his fingers down her spine until he was manipulating the muscles at the small of her back. Beverly had been complaining about backaches for a while now. Along with leg cramps. And literal pains in her ass.

"It seems that the only time you're really comfortable now, is when you're in bed," he observed. The bed size hologrid that their friends had created for their bed greatly assisted Beverly in getting comfortable with its varying gravity settings. But the bed was the only place where she seemed to find any relief.

"Jean-Luc, I've added at least twenty-three kilograms to my weight. My center of gravity has shifted. I can only lie on my left side now when I sleep..." She caught an expression on his face. "And if you say that I '_waddle_' when I walk," she warned.

"I would never say that word - aloud."

She elbowed him again. "Don't think it either."

He chuckled, even as his good humor flowed over her, through her senses. She shared it with her babies.

"So, have you completed your list of names?" he quietly asked, since the last time that he had asked that question they had had an argument, to put it mildly.

"Adele Marie, Marie Dianne, Deanna Marie, Felicianne Marie, Adelaide Marie, Maria Lucia…" Beverly could have continued on with her suggestions, but she could see that Jean-Luc wasn't really listening. "Guinan-anna? Suzette Quiarra?" she added.

The last name caught his attention. "Suzi Q?" He shuddered. "Beverly, you cannot seriously be considering…"

"No, I'm not. But I did have to do something to capture your attention, didn't I?" She turned her head and kissed his cheek. "Guinan seems to think that after the twins are born, they will let us know what names that they have chosen for themselves."

"I hope that they will have the good sense enough to sense what we would wish for their names to be."

"And what names do we wish, Jean-Luc? For our son I am partial to Jean-Robert. Or Jean-William, Jean-George…"

He leaned forward and silenced her with a kiss. "We still have time to consider and then discuss our choices." He paused, momentarily thought that she was the most beautiful sight that he had ever seen, and then smiled before adding, "Though William Robert has a nice sound to it."

Beverly relaxed and snuggled closer to her husband. They just rested for a while. Both were quite content at being held in each other's arms, at the moment.

"They like Mozart," she observed as she settled back even closer, against him.

He placed his finger against a tiny speaker placed on her abdomen. "Sonata in A major, isn't it?" he idly responded, as he felt more than heard the piano music.

"Yes." But Beverly wasn't paying attention to what her husband was saying. "Listen," she commanded. Beautiful piano music was drifting in through the terrace doors.

He lifted his head trying to hear what Beverly was noticing. "Shall we go and see if our offspring prefer Chopin to Mozart?" He instantly knew where it was coming from, and its source. Beverly nodded.

He slid out from behind her and then lifted her to her feet which at this stage of her pregnancy took a bit of doing, though he wisely refrained from commenting about her bulkiness. Beverly was having trouble getting up from most chairs now. Then he removed the micro-speakers that were resting on her belly and placed them on a side table. He smoothed down her aquamarine oversize tunic sweater, past her hips and until it clung to her navy blue leggings. He took her hand.

They strolled down the hallway and onto the terrace walking along the side of the house until they reached the grand salon, where their first official party had been held. They quietly entered, not wishing to disturb the cadet who was practicing on their antique Steinway grand piano.

She noticed them immediately, and stopped playing. "Am I disturbing you?"

"Of course not, cadet." Beverly quickly spoke up, smiling at the young woman dressed in her duty uniform. "I just hoped to introduce my babies to the glories of Chopin, being played by such a gifted pianist as yourself."

The tall, gangly cadet blushed over Beverly's words. She was not really used to such compliments like this from her superior officers.

"Please continue, cadet," Jean-Luc added.

"Preludes, Nocturnes or Waltzes?" Bronislawa Olezewski asked as she sat back down on the piano bench. Wesley's team mate was a frequent visitor to Picard House for she was being courted by the Picard's chef, Ludvig. And before the Christmas party had turned into a riot, she had performed a mini-concert and had been told by Admiral Jean-Luc Picard, that she was welcome to use the Picard Steinway whenever she wished to do so. Admiral Jean-Luc Picard just nodded, accepting whatever it was that she chose to play.

"Preludes first, I think," she whispered as her fingers stroked the keyboard. She tapped her padd which then projected streaming pages of the piano score which she had chosen to play. She caught Admiral Jean-Luc Picard's surprise at her sheet music display. "I don't know that much by memory," she explained. Moments later, the soft strains of the B minor prelude was performed.

Beverly pressed her abdomen into the ess curve of the solid rosewood grand piano, to allow her babies to both hear the notes as well as feel the reverberations from the soundboard. She grasped her husband's hand and pressed it against her stomach as the twins reacted to these new sounds and sensations. It was a moment out of time, forever treasured by the two lovers and soon-to-be parents.

After two preludes were played, Beverly sat down on one of the salon chairs, to listen to a few more of the cadet's choices. And after the cadet performed the Waltz in A flat major, Beverly stood. "Thank you, cadet. I appreciate your kindness to me. I am sorry that I have to leave, but it is time for me to rest."

Jean-Luc nodded at the cadet as he escorted Beverly out of their room, and into the elevator to go up to the family floor and their bedroom.

When he came back down, Jean-Luc noticed that the cadet was still playing in the grand salon. He sat by a wall to listen, still very impressed by this cadet's skill and talent as she tackled a Brahms waltz.

After a few minutes more of playing, Bronislawa stopped and stood, pulling the piano key cover shut over the keyboard. "Unfortunately, I have to study. I've got a Vulcan calculus test in the morning."

"Cadet, considering that your current senior class ranking is second for all of the academic scores of your entire class, I suspect that you do not have that much more studying to do." Jean-Luc approached her by the piano. He could tell that she was struggling with something. The way that she had attacked the Chopin Etude had revealed some of her internal disquiet.

"There are times when I feel like I don't know anything."

"There are times that I still feel that way myself." He chuckled as he closed the cover to the Steinway, letting the heavy solid wood lid rest against the top of the piano. "Especially when it comes to pregnant wives," he thought to himself he as he ran his hand along the glowing rosewood.

"Do such feelings ever go away?" She followed the admiral as he sat on a salon chair and then motioned for her to join him.

"Experience and confidence will chase most of those doubts away," Jean-Luc observed.

She shook her head as if denying such a thing were possible. "I am so unsure..."

And the Superintendent of the Academy tried to help this cadet who was Wesley's friend. And who was gradually becoming an unofficial member of his household as well thanks to her relationship with his chef. "About what, cadet?"

"I've been unofficially told that I am to be assigned to the _Enterprise_, when I graduate." She smiled as she conveyed this information to the former captain of the _Enterprise._

Jean-Luc nodded at this statement, for he had personally handled the posting request from the _Enterprise. _"Unofficially, Commander LaForge and Commander Data have specifically requested you," Admiral Picard explained. "And they are not the only starship officers who wanted you. My office received requests from seven other captains as well."

This bit of information startled her. "Thank you. But, you see - that is the problem."

"Meaning, cadet?" Something was clearly troubling this young lady.

"I am not so sure that I want a starship posting. Dr. Brahms has conveyed to me that she wants me to stay at Utopia Planetia as part of her team. That, in and of itself is a major inducement for my acceptance of her offer. " She nervously glanced away before she added, "And there are personal reasons as to why I should stay in Sector One instead of joining a starship."

A delicate shade of pink blossomed on her cheeks though he made no mention of her blushing. "Most cadets, when they graduate and become ensigns, focus on advancing their Starfleet careers first. That is the usual, accepted way of things. However, working for Leah Brahms is a major milestone for anyone's career book. Personal lives commonly take second place to an ensign's career. But if you accept Leah Brahms offer, you would be able to have both."

"I know. But is that truly wise? What if you love someone…"

"Cadet Olezewski, if you don't go to the _Enterprise_, you will regret that decision for the rest of your life. It's an opportunity given to very few ensigns." He paused for a second, studying the young woman. "And I personally know that Leah Brahms, if she wants you, will be willing to wait for you if you should choose to go to the _Enterprise."_

"But…"

"There is another possibility." A brief smile crossed his lips. "If Ludvig wishes to return to the _Enterprise _and become Captain Riker's personal chef, I will make no objection to that decision. Though I will miss him."

"But, what if…"

"What, cadet?"

"What if, after a while, I discover that Ludvig and I don't really belong together. We both then would be stuck together on a starship…"

"And you will have to learn how to cope with that possibility. Whether you are together as a couple or separate from each other, you will just simply have to deal with it, cadet. Knowing when to do your duty, on duty, and how to conduct your personal life when you are off duty is one of the most difficult things that any Starfleet officer has to learn how to do. It is a difficult balancing act. And it must be learned if you are going to have a successful career."

She considered his words. "Admiral, if you don't mind my getting personal…" He nodded his head with permission. "…it took you decades before you married Admiral Beverly. You did put your career and your captain's chair ahead of all other considerations."

"That was my personal choice. And in hindsight, it was not necessarily a wise decision on my part. I chose a command career track. You however, are choosing engineering. Not that such a choice does not mean that you might not one day have difficult decisions to make as an officer." His smile held more than a touch of irony. "I often wonder what my life would have been like if I had approached Beverly a year or two after she had been widowed. I might be expecting grandchildren now, instead of children." He rose and placed his hand on her shoulder. "Still, I accept my life as it is now. And the decisions that I have made." He looked down at the cadet, noting how serious she appeared, in spite of the fact that strands of shiny brown hair had escaped from her chignon and were now falling down about her shoulders. "It is possible to have a career and a personal life, cadet. Though it will take a great deal of work and determination in order to have both. If you choose to have it either now, or later, I will do all that I can to assist you." He paused for a moment studying her; wondering if he had ever been this young, this eager. "Of course, Ludvig could stay here on Earth. I know that Beverly adores him. And, being parted from him for a time could help clarify your feelings about his place in your life. And if, after a duty tour or two, you decide that you wish to return to Utopia Planetia, that transfer can be arranged."

"Or if I'd wish for Ludvig to join me on the _Enterprise?"_

"If Ludvig wishes it, then I will suggest it to Captain Riker."

"You've given me a lot to thing about, Sir."

"You can always come to me if you have anything that you wish to discuss, Bronislawa."

She nodded, accepting that this was true. "Thank you, Admiral."

Jean-Luc nodded as he watched her walk away. Even as he pondered how he was going to tell his wife that he'd just given her favorite chef permission to leave her, if that was what his chef's heart desired.

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

It was a sight that Beverly never envisioned that she would see. Guinan, Mildred and Lwaxana were sitting on the daybed in the nursery. Each was arguing that their individual ways of folding onesies was the proper way to fold them. Beverly shook her head, and decided not to join in with the debate. She had other things to worry about. Pressing a hand against her stomach, she kept telling herself that she was only feeling Braxton Hicks contractions. None of the other signs that she was about to go into labor were currently present.

Deciding that maybe she'd better just go get her tricorder and double check herself, she was stopped by Guinan. The lady walked up to her, placed her hand on Beverly's belly, and stood still for a few moments.

"Not yet," Guinan announced as if she were the authority on the subject of impending motherhood. And when labor would strike.

"I'd better check to make sure," Beverly argued as she felt another, not quite as strong, contraction.

"Yes, go and lie down," Guinan agreed, as she guided Beverly along. Her long dress of rose colored fabric flowed about her ankles. Yet she adeptly led Beverly. "Let me help you."

Lwaxana only studied Beverly for a moment before she added her thoughts on the matter. "Not yet," she agreed. "They're not ready to pop out." She nodded in the direction of the master bedroom. "They are ready to sleep now, though. So, go and take a nap yourself, my dear. All by your threesome."

Guinan and Beverly slowly walked through the connecting rooms to the bedroom. Guinan automatically checked that everything that should be ready, was ready from the nursery to the small packed bags for when Beverly would go to the hospital.

Guinan helped Beverly onto the bed, placed pillows under her legs, and then watched as Beverly adjusted the hologrid to the right gravity setting. Then she handed Beverly her tricorder. After a quick scan, Beverly handed it back to Guinan. The relief in her smile told Guinan all that she needed to know. Beverly was not in labor.

"Are the babies thinking in words yet? Or just in concepts?" Guinan asked. Her curiosity was getting the better of her. From what she had sensed from the babies, over the past few days, it had mainly been images rather than distinct words.

"A few words. But they are mainly thinking with their emotions."

"Mama and Papa, eh?" Guinan asked as she smoothed the coverlet over Beverly's body. "Any other words?"

"They don't know what it is yet, but they like the sound of '_fairy godmother',_" Beverly added as she closed her eyes.

"I've always been proud of that title," Guinan softly added as she saw how quickly Beverly nodded off. Lightly touching Beverly's tummy, Guinan added, "Sleep, Little Ones. Your Mama needs to rest right now… And so do you…" After a few moments, she was satisfied that all was well. Then she went into the nursery to refold all of the onesies that Lwaxana had folded, since Guinan knew that her way was the correct way to fold such baby items.


	2. Waddle, Waddle, Waddle

_**De-Tached: Story 5: Life with Beverly**_

_**Chapter : **_

"_**Waddle" **_

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

"Waddle, waddle, waddle…"

Superintendent Jean-Luc Picard ignored the voice calling from behind him in the corridor as he walked toward his office. He had recognized the voice instantly. And it brought a crankiness to his disposition that was usually foreign to him.

_"Waddle, waddle, waddle…"_ The sounds echoed about the empty corridor bouncing off the crystal aluminum and chrome walls..

He entered his office and was half-tempted to order the computer to lock the door. But he had the sense that she'd find a way into his office one way or the other. A locked door wouldn't stop her. The only thing that was worse than being subjected to the lady's presence, was to have a witness to his exchange with the woman. He did not doubt that the building's security was ever vigilant. And would record everything if he were foolish enough to do something. Besides, the last thing he wanted was for his actions to be perceived as petulant. _For he knew what Beverly would say if he displayed such behavior..._

It was late. And he regretted that he had not gone home more than two hours ago. Still, he had a lot of work left to do. And increasingly, when he was around Beverly, he just wasn't getting any Academic work done. Student evaluations were currently being done by the professors and instructors, and he knew that it was his duty to review every report on all of the senior classmen. In a few months time, these cadets would be Starfleet officers. He held their futures in his hands. He would worry about all of the other cadets later.

But with Beverly in the last stage of her pregnancy, he was finding it difficult to balance everything that he felt he should be doing as a superintendent much less everything that he wanted do as a husband and forthcoming father.

"What are you still doing here?" an acerbic voice asked as the door to his inner office slid open.

His response was to glare at her, and then to study her. She was in civilian dress - a bright blue one, to be precise - so he assumed that her chasing him down and making immature, annoying goose noises had little to do with Starfleet business.

She tapped her foot. And then she smiled, assessing the temper of the man. She so enjoyed in unsettling this man - especially for a good cause which, in this case, was his very expectant wife.

"I have a lot to do before I take paternity leave." Being in this woman's presence always made him grumpy. And though his stoic officer's mask was firmly affixed, his annoyance was revealed by the tone of his voice.

"Amazing." She shook her head even as she chose to sit down in the chair opposite his desk, without being asked. "You may not know it, but you even walk the way that Beverly walks now." Under her breath she just had to add, "Waddle, waddle, waddle."

"You are not the first to point this out to me, Captain Pulaski."

"Nor will I be the last, Admiral Picard," she stated quite pleasantly.

He had to ruefully admit to himself that Kate Pulaski did have a point. Somehow, whenever he relaxed or was not totally focused in the moment, he found himself automatically imitating his wife's current manner of walking. "Waddle, waddle, waddle," he muttered to himself.

Kate Pulaski decided that it would be wiser not to laugh at this moment. For she was a prudent woman as well as a wise one.

He nodded toward the stack of padds on his desk. "I know I should be home with Beverly. But if I am to take paternity leave when the twins are born…"

Kate nodded, understanding his position. There wasn't a senior officer in Starfleet that had not been there at some point in time. "I have always believed that the higher the rank, the greater the amount of work there is to be done."

"Unfortunately, in my case, it is exponentially bureaucratic." He eyed her. "At least a doctor can escape to the surgery or to a medical conference, now and then."

Kate settled herself into the chair, ignoring this incendiary pronouncement. "I've heard tell that some consider you to be a good superintendent."

He scowled at her. And then he opened up his desk drawer and pulled out two low ball glasses.

Kate nodded when he next pulled out a bottle of Aldebaran whiskey, thereby verifying that she was not officially on duty. "I was just visiting Beverly," she announced. "I gave her a very brief report on how the Hospital Starship project is going." She nodded again when he started pouring and didn't nod again for him to stop until the glass was one third full.

"Yes, Holt did mention how ably you were managing things after taking over for Beverly once she went on maternity leave."

"Is that your indirect way of asking me if I want Beverly's job on a permanent basis?"

He hesitated.

That was enough of a response for Kate. "I don't want it - not really, Jean-Luc. Though my time on board the _Enterprise_ was short, I thoroughly enjoyed being her CMO. And I am looking forward to becoming a hospital starship CMO in the not-too-distant future." She took a small sip of her whiskey and let its smoothness trickle down her throat. "I could do Beverly's job if I really had to do it. But unless circumstances change dramatically, I don't really care to do it." She drank a little more of her whiskey.

Relaxing - that is as much as he would permit himself to relax in Kate Pulaski's presence - Jean-Luc tasted his own whiskey. It was exactly as good as he remembered it to be.

For a while, there was simply companionship and good whiskey between them. A truce, as it were.

He stirred. "What do you need to tell me about Beverly, then?"

She ruefully nodded, accepting his perspicacity about her presence in his office at this late hour. "All things considering, she's in very good health. However, I wish that you had told me about the babies' mental abilities earlier." She shook her head. "And no, I'm not going to put anything about it in my official reports. I'll respect Beverly's wishes. How and what your babies are, is between you and their doctor. I am just a concerned, unofficial onlooker. It's how they have been influencing you and Beverly - and vice versa - that concerns me."

"This is a problem, then?"

"Jean-Luc, soon those babies are going to be undergoing the birth process. Even with today's medicine, birth is still a traumatic experience. The last things those babies need is to feel their mother's pain in conjunction with their own trauma." With a smug smile she added, "Not to mention your panic when Beverly goes into labor. Though I am looking forward to seeing that." Her smile at this thought bordered on the positively evil.

He ignored her last remark. "Dr. Bolt, Lwaxana and Guinan have discussed this problem with us. Dr. Bolt's solution is fetal transport. I am not so sure that I disagree with her."

Kate nodded her head. "Either that or a Caesarean section. If Beverly and the babies are unconscious, there will be no emotional trauma."

"Guinan is arguing that Beverly should have a natural child birth. Lwaxana agrees. Between the pair of them, they think that they can guide the babies through the process and protect them from the emotional trauma at the same time." He drank a little more. "I am not so sure about the wisdom of this."

"Ultimately, it will be Beverly's decision. If you want my opinion - and I know that you do…" Her grin was devilish as she just knew of his internal dilemma. "… go with the process that is the _safest_ for both mother and children."

"I do agree with you about that." He looked away from her knowing gaze. "I love my children. But if I were to lose Beverly…" He didn't have to say any more.

She knew. And she understood. And in spite of her enjoyment in bedeviling the man now and then, she never once faulted him as a man. He was one of the best honorable men that she'd ever known. She finished off her drink. "Well, then, don't let me keep you from your work. Once you are done, go home, and stay there."

"The babies will be born very soon, I take it."

Laughing, she stood and put down her glass. "If I'm any judge of things, it will be sooner rather than later. And you should be there - sharing every ache and pain."

His eyes widened as the impact of her words sank in. For so far, he had shared a lot of the physical symptoms of pregnancy with his wife, thanks to the KesPrytt. And he hadn't really complained - at least, not out loud. However, he had not considered his connection to Beverly and the possibility of sharing labor pains with her until this very moment.


	3. Chapter 3: Unthinkable

_**De-Tached: Story 5: Life with Beverly**_

_**Chapter 3 : Unthinkable**_

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

"Jean-Luc has finally figured out what my going into labor might mean to him," Beverly calmly stated as she sipped her decaffeinated Lady Grey iced tea. The beverage was not quite equal to the real thing - no decaffeinated black tea was according to her taste buds - but it was an acceptable substitute. There was only so much spice tea that her finicky pregnant stomach could tolerate at the moment.

"It's about time," Guinan agreed as she helped herself to one more of Mildred's famous chocolate chip cookies sans nuts. "I'm going to have to get Krebbie's recipe," she observed, almost to herself.

"I think that the secret ingredient is French butter," Beverly noted as she finished off a cookie as well.

"Either that or bourbon," Guinan countered. "Maybe both - with a dash of rum."

Beverly then put down her tall glass, and allowed herself to bask in the sun for a few minutes more. She pushed a button and the adjustable bright blue awning above this portion of the terrace extended out some more so that she was now in the shade. "Still is the best way to absorb Vitamin D," she idly commented as she caught Guinan's questioning look."

"I didn't say anything," Guinan quickly stated as she stood and then poured more iced tea into their glasses. It was a surprisingly warm and sunny day, and the ladies were determined to enjoy it. Guinan returned to her lounge chair with its bright azure and white striped upholstery. Once she settled herself back down, and adjusting her tangerine robe about her body, she casually asked, "So, what to you think of Ryllis?"

Beverly stopped trying to doze. opened her eyelids, and considered just how casually Guinan had asked this question. _And why. _"I like her," she announced as if she were testing Guinan's waters.

"I do too," Guinan finally stated only after she had taken several more drinks of her tea. "In spite of somehow being related to Lwaxana Troi-Wiley and her many exes, she seems to be pretty level-headed for a Betazoid ex-in-law."

"Doesn't hurt that she's been a nursemaid to other telepathic babies," Beverly added, almost as if she were arguing with herself. "And my babies were quite accepting of her when she touched their minds earlier today."

"Those twins of yours will always know how to pick the good guys from the bad," Guinan stated. "The only thing wrong with Ryllis so far is the fact that Lwaxana found her."

"Jean-Luc and I need a nursemaid - especially for after - when you have to leave." Beverly raised an eyebrow. "Besides, I thought that you were going to bring in one of your friends as a potential nursemaid."

"Uncle Terkim volunteered."

Beverly raised her other eyebrow. "Your _legendary_ Uncle Terkim?" Beverly became excited at the thought of meeting this man. "I really am looking forward to finally meeting him, especially after all of the tall tales that you've told me about him."

"Uncle Terkim is great with kids. He's still a child himself in some ways." On Beverly's skeptical look she added, "Some El Aurians of the masculine persuasion, take a _long_ time to grow up." Her voice dropped. "If they ever do…" Guinan shuddered. "Only problem is that Terkim is not so great with our Q. They have a history. Once he found out that Q was going to be an honorary godfather, he changed his mind and said that he would come when he could."

"Oh?"

"He may still show up. I still want Terkim to come and meet the twins. Even if he only sticks around for a little while, there is a lot of stuff that he can teach them..." Now Guinan raised an eyebrow. "The kind of stuff of which even Jean-Luc would approve. Only problem is that by the time he actually shows up the twins could be at the Academy. Terkim has always had some difficulty grasping the concept of linear time…"

"I'm sure Ryllis could use the help if Terkim shows up," a somewhat petulant voice remarked from behind them. One did not have to be a Betazoid in order to sense that Lwaxana had taken a dislike to a man that she had yet to meet.

Beverly thought about rolling her eyeballs, but decided, instead, to use her chaise lounge's sturdy arm as a brace in order to roll and pull herself onto her left side. She shoved aside the light blue lap throw that Guinan had insisted that she use. In spite of the warmth of the day, there was an occasional gust of a chilling, ocean breeze. "Hello, Lwaxana."

She rushed to Beverly's side. "You shouldn't be doing that by yourself," she fussed as she helped Beverly complicate the maneuver of turning a very pregnant lady over onto her side.

After almost seven months of Lwaxana's fussing, Beverly silently hoped that one day soon, Deanna would become pregnant. For if there was anything that her friend deserved for convincing her mother (and her mother's husband) to come and stay with the Picards, it was to have her mother fuss over Deanna the way that she was fussing over Beverly.

"I heard that," Lwaxana sarcastically announced as she poured herself a glass of iced tea. "Would that Deanna did get pregnant. Time's running out for her, too!"

Beverly knew that she just had to ask. "Deanna's probably going to be fertile for at least another twenty years. Her time is not expiring that fast."

"Well, it's running out for me. Twenty years from now I won't be able to chase after my grandchild the way that I'm going to be able to chase after my godchildren."

"No matter," Guinan softly remarked. "_I'll _still be able to chase after your grandchildren twenty years from now. And Beverly's grandchildren too." She arched a hairless eyebrow is Beverly's direction, complementing it with an immutable smile.

Beverly felt a twinge. She decided that both ladies were giving her a headache. The only problem was that there wasn't much that she could do to alleviate it.

A very pleasant sounding, soothing voice joined the conversation. "You're wearing out the little mama. Shame on both of you!" Her voice was nice. Her chastisement was not.

Both Guinan and Lwaxana bristled.

Ryllis ignored them. Her focus was on her employer. Sensing the lady's emotions, she glided down the steps and over to Beverly. Her long stride was surprisingly graceful for such a tall, sturdy woman. There was an ageless look about her as if one could not tell if she were a Betazed thirty-or-eighty-year-old. But her secure, brisk sense of self-assurance and competence bespoke of a somewhat younger person's energy rather than the movements of an older woman. And her choice of a seafoam green and aquamarine patterned matching tunic and pants was also in keeping with a more youthful image. She flipped her deep black long braid over her shoulder and onto her back. She liked wearing her long hair woven into a braid. She didn't care that much for the typical Betazoid curly look. But she knew that once the babies reached the grabbing stage, she would have to wear her hair up. Long hair (not to mention long earrings) were just too tempting a target for tiny little fingers.

Somehow, Lwaxana had found in a nanny, exactly what Beverly needed at the moment - a sane anchor for the upcoming chaos.

Guinan silently granted the Betazed ambassadress her kudos. Lwaxana graciously nodded.

Ryllis sat on the edge of the lounge, massaging Beverly's neck and shoulders at the points where she was hurting. Admiral Picard couldn't help herself. Within moments, Beverly felt better. She sighed with pleasure as this slender woman brought her relief. Her headache was vanishing under the touch of these cool, skilled fingers.

Lwaxana could sense Beverly's unspoken approval and appreciation of the lady. "Ryllis is a skilled masseuse, too," she casually announced, as if Beverly had not already just discovered this. "She will guide the twins…" Lwaxana abruptly stopped speaking. For she had just sensed the twins' emotions for a moment. She dragged her high dudgeon about her like a cloak and then announced, "Oh, you are _not_ going to let the twins pick their own names, are you? A Betazoid mother would never do so!" She huffed. "You're the parent! You're supposed to be choosing names that will inspire them through life! And not letting such inexperienced minds go willy-nilly about picking their own names!"

"And what is wrong with the babies _liking_ their names?" Ryllis placidly asked. She'd only been Lwaxana's in-law for a few months quite a few years ago. But she had the measure of this woman very well.

"They're not supposed to _like_ their names - they are supposed to _live up _to them!"

"Hush!" Ryllis commanded as she stood. She faced Lwaxana. "That means _you_, Lwaxana. Shut up!" She turned back to her charge. "Come, Admiral. It's time for your nap." She helped pull a silently laughing Beverly to her feet. And then she guided the pregnant admiral away, leaving in their wake a sputtering Lwaxana whose complexion almost matched the color of her burgundy gown.

"After all that, I think that you'd better call me Beverly," the pregnant lady observed as her new employee helped her waddle toward the elevator to her bed chamber.

It was a little early for Beverly's nap, but Guinan decided not to mention it. She sensed an ally in this Betazed. And Guinan then determined that this lady would do just fine. For Guinan knew that in two more months, she would have to rejoin the _Enterprise_. Will Riker would have need of her more than Beverly.

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

"William Alexander Robert Picard," Beverly announced as her spouse entered their bedroom. She used the French pronunciation for 'Robert'.

He stood in the doorway, surprised to see Beverly not napping. And seemingly full of energy at the moment. Beverly had been on a roller coaster ride of emotions and energy levels during the past month. He never quite knew what to expect when he entered their bedroom.

"I've been making lists of names. And then I've been saying them out loud to hear how they sound." She smiled up at her husband as he came over to the side of the bed and sat down next to her. "I think Will's name, as well as my father's and your brother's names work well together." She raised her hands above her head and carefully stretched her muscles.

He reached over and grasped her hand, automatically stroking it as he tried to judge just how serious she was over this choice of names for their son. He paused, and then chuckled as he felt something. "Our son seems to like the sound of it," he remarked as he bent down and lightly nuzzled her abdomen. He raised his head and then bestowed on Beverly his most loving, happy look. "William Alexander Robert Picard it is, then."

"Unless I get a better idea," Beverly just had to add. "I still haven't made up my mind about our daughter's name." She giggled. Ever since the start of her second trimester, Beverly had found herself giggling - which was something that she hadn't really done during any of the years of her adult life. She leaned forward a little bit, speaking directly to her belly. "I don't care how much you like the name - I am not calling you _Lwaxana!_"

Jean-Luc visibly shuddered at this thought. And then was shocked to realize that Beverly - and his daughter - were not joking about this name suggestion.

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

Captain Kate Pulaski was surprised when, after her brief daily visit with Beverly, that one of those nameless interns that seemed to wander the halls during daylight hours, had pulled her aside and stated that Admiral Jean-Luc Picard wished to see the doctor in his library office.

Kate breezed into the library, saw that it was empty, and glanced around the room. She was not quite willing to admit out loud that she really liked this admiral's office. To a real bibliophile, this office was classier than Fleet Admiral Winston Holt Wiley's office. He had too much French frou-frou furniture for Kate Pulaski's tastes. Everything about this library bespoke of the Admirals' Picard tastes. There wasn't a sign of a fancy-smancy decorator's influence anywhere. She was still minutely inspecting several archeological artifacts on one of the shelves when Jean-Luc Picard's footsteps could be heard echoing down the steps of the wrought iron spiral staircase in the corner by the fireplace.

Plastering her best, friendly smile on her face, she turned to greet the expectant father.

"Beverly was sleeping when I left her," Kate announced.

"Yes. She still is. I just went up stairs and poked my head into the room to see if she needed me." He motioned toward the leather Chesterfield style couch by the fireplace. "I am assuming that all is still well with my wife?"

"Don't you get daily reports from Dr. Bolt?" Kate sat down on the end of the couch, still somewhat looking about and noticing things.

"They are morning reports. When I was with Beverly this afternoon, I thought that she seemed more tired than usual. I am assuming that you scanned Beverly…" His voice trailed off, wondering if he was presuming too much.

"Yes, when I saw that she was sleeping, I placed a padd with my reports, on the desk, scanned her and then left. Then one of your interns waylaid me." She waited. He obviously wanted to ask her something. But she wasn't going to make it too easy for him.

"Would you care for some coffee or tea?" He eyed her uniform. "Or, something stronger?"

"Believe it or not, I've grown to like Earl Grey. Hot."

He tapped the comm badge attached to his grey fisherman's knit sweater. "Mr. Ludvig, would you please bring tea for two to the library?"

"Yes, Admiral!" a cheerful voice responded.

Kate crossed her legs, picked a piece of imaginary lint off of her duty uniform slacks, and then decided to show Jean-Luc Picard a little mercy. "Beverly is fine, Admiral." She raised her palm as if to stop any questions. "And yes, she is more tired. If she doesn't wake by 2000 hours, I'd wake her, bring her dinner in bed, and then coax her back to sleep." Kate took a breath, as if marshaling her thoughts. "I noticed that she has the anti-grav hologrid set at fifty percent."

"Yes. Beverly started sleeping at that setting three days ago. Dr. Bolt did not seem concerned by it."

"Quite frankly, papa-to-be, I think that Beverly will be a mother by the end of the week. Her body is telling her that she needs all the rest that she can get."

Jean-Luc nodded, even as he motioned for Ludvig to enter, pushing a tea cart in front of him. He placed the cart in front of Jean-Luc, and left when the admiral motioned that he needed nothing more.

Kate's eyes widened as she noted a very nice selection of butter cream pastries, cookies, berries with cream, and cheese with biscuits. "You eat like this every day? It's a wonder that you are still skinny."

"I try to run at least 10 kilometers a day," he casually explained. "When Beverly was underweight during the pregnancy, between Ludvig and Mildred, they were plying her with tens of thousands of calories a day. Unfortunately, there were days when she just couldn't keep it down. But I was still linked with her - and her appetites." He gave Kate a rueful grin. "I really find it difficult not to indulge - which is why I am running whenever I can." He placed a cookie on a tea plate.

"From her weight gain, I would say that Beverly is on a more even keel right now." Kate accepted a floral hand-painted tea cup and saucer from Jean-Luc after declining his silent offer of cream or sugar.

"She is still emotionally somewhat erratic. This afternoon she was bouncing around with more energy than all of my cadet interns combined. She sat on the terrace for a few hours with Lwaxana and Guinan And then, an hour later she crashed. And she has been asleep since."

"Well, medically, all is as it should be." She drank some tea, and then pointed at some chocolate gateau garnished with toasted almonds. "I'm going to the gym, so I'd like a piece of that."

Picard merely smiled to himself as he handed the lady her cake.

"So, Jean-Luc, why did you want to see me?"

"Kate…" He looked over at the portrait of his officers that Mr. Data had painted before he turned back to stare at Kate. "You had mentioned the fact that I will probably share my wife's labor with her. How do you think that I should proceed?"

"Be there as her coach, obviously." In the meantime, she closed her eyes at the first taste of the chocolate. It was bliss.

"But what if I am overcome by pain. It is my understanding that as a birthing coach, I am to help Beverly through the contractions. But if I am incapacitated by them as well…"

"We'll drag in Guinan and Mildred to coach each of you if necessary."

He considered this and then nodded. "Uh, why not Lwaxana?"

"You know that gong that Mr. Homm likes to bang during dinner?" He warily nodded. "Well, during birth, the Betazoid women often have that gong gonged, as well as something like bongos being bonged as well. Throw in the fact that Lwaxana fancies herself a singing soprano harbinger of baby news - well, if it were my birthing room, I'd order that woman to watch the birth on sub-space, on another planet in another solar system. And preferably in another quadrant." She ate some more cake. "I can explain this to Admiral Wiley if you want me to."

He considered Kate's words. And mentally ran through several pithy Klingon curses at the same time. But his calm exterior denied the existence of his inner turmoil. "Thank you, Kate, for the warning. I'll take care of Holt." He shuddered at the thought of it. "I can only imagine what Beverly would do to me if Lwaxana succeeded in bringing Betazoid customs to the birthing of our twins." He thought some more. "We have a Betazed nanny. Have you met Ryllis?"

"Yes, I've met Nanny Ryllis. I think that she is a wise choice. I've encountered this nurse and nanny in the past and have been impressed by her unflappability. Which is a rare talent when it comes to babies." She finished off her tea and handed her cup back to Jean-Luc for some more. "And no, Nanny Ryllis does not follow the House of Rixx customs."

"Thank g…, uh, good." He poured more tea for both of them. "Actually, I wanted to discuss with you ways of dealing with my link to Beverly during labor. I am beginning to believe that Beverly should have a Caesarean section."

"Well, it would be easier for you."

He glared at her. "Another alternative is if I am sedated some how, but not necessarily unconscious."

"Are you talking about getting drunk?"

He grimaced. "That is one possibility."

"It might work. I'll ask Lwaxana to see if it works for Betazoid men when their wives go into labor." She drank her tea. "What about a fetal transport of the babies?"

"Beverly would still be awake and undergoing labor pains. Which means that neither one of us would truly experience the birth of our children."

"Trust me, Jean-Luc. Pain is most definitely part of the experience of birthing babies."

"I just want to alleviate as much stress as possible for Beverly." He sternly glanced at the doctor. "I am well aware of all what you doctors are not quite saying to me. Her age is playing a major factor in your concern for her health, isn't it?"

"Actually, it's a combination of her age and the fact that she is having twins," Kate quietly answered. "Twins at any age is a very stressful event. But, so far, there is no evidence that anything is actually wrong - or is about to go wrong." Surprising even herself, she reached over and patted his arm as if to reassure him. "In another couple of days, Dr. Bolt is going to suggest to Beverly that she should go to Starfleet Medical. I also agree that Beverly should go to the maternity rooms there."

"You think that Beverly should be hospitalized?"

"Only as a precaution, Jean-Luc. For if something should go wrong, I would want Beverly to be in the best place possible for both her and the babies. And that is in our hands, and with the expert obstetricians at Medical."

There was a light tap on the library door. "Enter."

Ludvig came into the room, bearing a silver wrapped box. He handed it to Dr. Pulaski. "Doctor, a few of my pastries for you to take back to your temporary quarters."

Surprised by this gesture, Kate nodded her thanks.

Ludvig then left.

But Jean-Luc sensed a hidden censure toward him in the way that Ludvig had spoken to Captain Pulaski. And he intuited as to why.

"I didn't think," he murmured to himself. _He would do anything for Beverly's sake. He knew what he had to do. _He stood. "Dr. Pulaski, would your prefer to stay here at Picard house, during Beverly's confinement? You could even have an office in the business wing."

Kate almost dropped her box of cakes. Being invited to stay with Jean-Luc Picard was something that she had never even remotely considered. _That Jean-Luc Picard should be asking her to temporarily live with him - why, it was unthinkable. _And then she weighed the pros and cons of coming here. Of course, she would have to put up with Jean-Luc Picard. On the other hand, when she'd been the CMO on his _Enterprise_, they'd never quite gotten around to killing each other - though there were moments when being thrown into the brig for her perceived insubordination, had seemed to be a real possibility.

And of course, there would be all the tall tales that she could one day tell to Captain Riker of what life was like staying in the house with a pregnant Beverly, Winston and Lwaxana, Wesley, Mildred, and the other cast of a hundred characters that seemed to be swarming about Beverly during the latter days of her pregnancy. She made up her mind.

"Thank you for the invitation, Admiral. I accept." Kate pretended not to noticed that Jean-Luc blanched. "I'll come tomorrow after work."

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

He found Ryllis in the nursery, folding garments that his wife and Guinan kept calling 'onesies'. Though for the life of him, he could not figure out why the little outfits were so referenced.

"Yes, Admiral. What can I do for you?" Ryllis stood as he entered the room.

"Are you a member of Starfleet, Ryllis?"

"No, Sir."

"Then please, won't you call me by my first name?"

"Of course, Jean-Luc," she calmly answered as she sat back down in one of the two rockers in the room. She nodded that he should take the other rocker. "What can I do you for?"

Surprised by her use of such a colloquial North American phrase, Jean-Luc paused to study the lady before he could answer her question. "I, uh, wanted to tell you that Dr. Pulaski is moving into House Picard. She'll be here tomorrow."

"Excellent." But somehow, she knew that something else was puzzling the man. "My late husband Etienne, was from the Midwest. That phrase - it was something that he used to say now and then."

"Etienne?"

"He was of French descent. From what I've heard about you, you're rather proud of your French ancestry too." She looked out the French doors at the garden for a moment, as if collecting her thoughts. "Oddly enough, I think that Etienne was in Paris only once. He preferred Illinois. And he drank beer - not wine. He loved his lagers..."

Jean-Luc decided to learn some more about this woman who would be caring for his twins. "You are a widow?"

"Etienne was a civilian doctor on board the _Melbourne_ at Wolf 359," she matter-of-factly stated. She watched the admiral stiffen at this bit of news. She felt his mental barriers shutter around his mind. She'd been told that he'd had some experience with Vulcan mental training. It showed. "Jean-Luc, I do not blame you for his death. I realized a long time ago that if you hadn't been Locutus, the Borg would have won. My children would be dead. Both of my boys are alive and kicking in Starfleet. George is a lieutenant on board the _Oklahoma._ He is an astrophysicist. My younger son is an ensign and is part of the diplomatic staff attached to Clarion. I'm not a grandmother - yet. But George is married, so I keep hoping."

He softly spoke. "I thank you for your consideration, madam." He moved as if to stand.

"So, what did you wish to speak to me about?"

"It's complicated, Ryllis."

"How, so?"

"You know of my telepathic/empathic link with my wife and the minds of my twins?"

"Yes, of course. That's why Lwaxana sent for me."

"Well, Beverly's labor is approaching. And I don't know what to do."

"You're linked - of course!" She understood, now. "Did the doctors suggest the procedure that you call a Cesarean section?"

"Yes. But I was thinking of drinking…"

"Brandy would indeed of course, be for _your_ benefit."

Jean-Luc blinked. Rarely had anyone ever-so-subtly chastised him like this woman just had. He accepted it without comment. By the gleam in the nanny's eye, he knew that she understood. "What then should I do? What do Betazoid expectant fathers do during labor?"

Her grin was at funny looking slant as she answered his question. "_Drink._" Only by the exasperated look in his eye, did she know how swiftly that she'd gotten to him. She admired his sense of control. "There's a special sense-enhancing wine cocktail that they use. I brought some with me. At the first sign of Beverly's labor, you can try it. If it doesn't work, then I'll suggest to the doctors the alternatives. In any case, my link along with Guinan's link, will be strong enough to protect the babies psyches during the birth trauma, if the doctors opt for natural childbirth or natal transport."

Jean-Luc nodded in acceptance of her words. He then looked about the room noting the two mobiles of starships above the cribs, the glowing galaxies painted on the ceiling, and the mounds of neatly folded clothing in a large cupboard. Everything looked ready. "If there is anything that still needs to be done, or something that you want either for yourself or the twins, please do not hesitate to ask."

"Thank you. I've already seen that storage room. Did someone tell you that you were expecting a set of baby admiral septuplets?"

He laughed at this. "Considering how much is in that storage room, it's possible that such a rumor was spread about."

"Lwaxana's doing, no doubt."

He only nodded at this knowing statement. "What eventually we decide cannot be used, we will donate."

"Good."

He stood. "Ryllis, I am not exactly accustomed to dealing with nursemaids and nannies. I hope that you will help guide me in that regard. In the meantime, naturally, you have the run of the house and the gardens. There are even horses in the stables, if your ride. Though, please be mindful of whatever security might tell you."

"I do ride, Jean-Luc. Western saddle if you have it. And I do understand about security."

He nodded, pleased at this bit of news. "If you wish to use my library, please check to see if I am in it. I am attempting to keep up with my superintendent's work in spite of being on paternity leave, now. You are welcome to use the library, but there will be occasions when it will be off limits - I will be in there on Starfleet business.

"Of course, Jean-Luc."

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

"Jean-Luc, I have just one thing to say to you," Mildred huffed and puffed. "If you get drunk when Beverly goes into labor, I'll arrange for Holt and Lwaxana to _permanently_ live with you!" She huffed some more. "They _like it here_ in spite of all the rumors flying about at Starfleet Headquarters. And their coming to live here will be only my _first_ revenge against you for doing such a thing to my poor little Beverly!"

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

"So, Ryllis told you about the Betazed tradition of the husbands getting drunk during childbirth," Lwaxana cackled at a man who was becoming more and more bewildered with every conversation that he was having over this matter. "You're a man after my own heart! I knew I should have introduced myself at that Embassy party where you talked Deanna into becoming your ship's counselor."

"No, he's not a man after your own heart," Guinan rudely interrupted. "Go with the Cesarean section, Jean-Luc. You'll have less apologizing to do to Beverly, when all is said and done," Guinan advised.

She only smiled evilly at Lwaxana when Jean-Luc wasn't looking.


	4. Chapter 4: The Not Quite Ultimate

_**De-Tached: Story 5: Life with Beverly**_

_**Chapter 4: The Not Quite Ultimate Turbo-Lift Story**_

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

Beverly opened her eyes. It was only a twinge, but she had felt it. It had disturbed her just enough to bring her out of her restless sleep. Of course, just about everything now, bothered her. Sleeping, turning, thinking, rolling over, lifting her head, breathing, snuggling, moving, etc. - it all distressed her now. She reached for her hologrid controls, and lowered the gravity setting to forty-five percent. Sighing, she tried to find a comfortable position on her left side. She was marginally successful.

Jean-Luc moved closer to her, spooning against her body. "Go back to sleep," he mumbled as he lightly caressed her abdomen.

Smiling to herself, she leaned into his embrace. Even when he was almost asleep, he had a care for her.

A few minutes later, she felt another twinge. This one was slightly more intense. She stirred again, trying to find a way to ease this pain.

A wary Jean-Luc raised his head, trying to focus his eyes in the almost complete darkness of their bedroom. "What is it, _mon coeur?"_

"Nothing - _I think."_ She rubbed her side to see if that would help relieve the stitch. She didn't blame him for being on edge. Her nerves were getting frazzled too. _All this waiting…_

He immediately leaned over her and picked up the medical tricorder that Beverly had stored on the nightstand. He handed it to her. "Lights, fifty percent," he ordered. Their bedroom became illuminated.

"I do know how to read a medical tricorder in the dark, Jean-Luc," she sleepily teased, as she scanned herself. Then she dramatically sighed as she put down her instrument. "Unfortunately, I'm nowhere near the first stage of labor, _Daddy…" _She reached over and adjusted the hologrid setting to forty percent gravity.

He felt the difference in the gravity setting immediately. "Are you in pain?" he asked as he gently stroked his palms down her spine and across her ribcage. "Would you like me to give you a massage?"

"Actually, maybe we should consider calling Commander S'Rock."

This statement, more than anything else, woke him up. "And what can Commander S'Rock give to you that I cannot do?"

"He says he knows how to give foot massages that will induce labor," Beverly sighed as she nestled against her husband's body. "Apparently, he has studied Chinese micro-system reflexology techniques which supposedly can cause labor. I am a bit skeptical about that." She reached over and grasped her husband's hand that had been resting on her hip, and enfolded it in her hands, against her breast. "But give me another twenty-four hours. I'll probably be willing to try anything by then."

"Lights - five percent," Jean-Luc ordered as he again rested against his wife's very rotund body. Much as he loved the fact that she was pregnant with their children and was soon to give birth, part of him regretted the fact that she was in such discomfort. He felt guilty over this even as he shared her pain with her.

"Do you wish to consult Commander S'Rock in the morning?" Jean-Luc softly asked as he rested his head against their pillows near her head.

"Yes, if only to see just how far Kate Pulaski has corrupted him."

This gave him pause. "Oh, so you do agree that Captain Pulaski is an evil influence," he teased, feeling vindicated for his opinion of the woman.

"I've always know _that_, Jean-Luc. Any CMO worth their salt has to be evil. Otherwise how else would we strike terror in the hearts of all our underlings? _Not to mention dastardly captains plotting to avoid their yearly physical at all costs_?"

"I always suspected that you had a campaign of terror against me on board the _Enterprise_. I knew there was some sort of nefarious plot."

She chuckled. "Right. And with my plotting, it only took me twenty-odd years to convince you to love me."

"That statement is incorrect, _mon coeur_, for I had already fallen in love with you ever so long ago."

"That's true. My real problem was in convincing you into doing something about it, Jean-Luc. You were an obstinate man."

"Beverly…," he warned.

She suddenly stiffened with a hitch to her breath.

He felt their twins tumble beneath his palm.

"What is it?"

"Our babies are running out of space to play," she informed him between the babies' movements inside her abdomen. Her breath was unsteady. She was silent for several long moments before she spoke again. "Jean-Luc, I think that in the morning, it is time for me to go to Starfleet Medical." He started to rise and she stopped him. "And no, I am not in labor - just yet." She had to take another couple of deep breaths before she could continue. "It's just that the twins know when they kick and move about that they are hurting me. And they don't wish to hurt me. But they can't stay in one place either, especially since they are really crowding each other about now in my uterus." She brought his hand to her lips and she kissed his knuckles, then placed his palm back on her tummy. "It's time, Jean-Luc."

"I am at your command, Beverly." The specter of impending fatherhood loomed before his eyes. _He wasn't quite sure that he was ready…_

She chuckled again.

"What?"

"Mildred placed a couple of bets for me in the Starfleet Medical and _Enterprise _betting pools. I might actually win some credits…"

He could tell that she was looking for some sort of distraction from him. So, it was his turn to chuckle. "There are betting pools on board the _Enterprise_? Why, whatever will Captain Riker think? _Shocking. Absolutely shocking."_

"It would be _shocking _if there _weren't_ any betting pools. And my money would be placed on Will Riker as being the one who instigated the baby betting pool in the first place…"

"I always thought that it was Mr. Data who did that…"

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

"The purple one," his bride announced, calling out to him as he stood in the middle of their walk-in closet.

He didn't have to voice his suspicions out loud. He knew that she was teasing him one more time over his most unfortunate choice of words a few months ago. _Beverly would never let him forget that he had once thought of her as a purple whale in her pregnant state…_

He picked up off of a hanger what could best be described as a purple caftan. He had a sneaking hunch that this caftan had been a baby shower gift for he doubted that Beverly would have ever bought anything with such a screamingly 'loud' blue, yellow and red geometric flower pattern against a bright purple ground.

He walked into their bedroom and held it up. "This one?" He didn't have to give voice to what he suspected. She knew his preferences too well too.

"Yes, that one. And don't give me that look. It is one of Lwaxana's many presents to my wardrobe." She grinned. "And could I help it if it will somehow get left behind when we leave the hospital?"

"Such a tragedy. That would indeed be a tragic turn of events." He walked over to their bed and helped Beverly drop the caftan over her head. She wasn't quite ready to leave the lower gravity of the bed even though she was sitting upright. He pulled the silky fabric about her as best he could. Then he sat down next to his bride. "Do you wish for me to contact Dr. Bolt?"

"Kate stuck her head in the door when you were in the bathroom. She says that everything will be ready and waiting for us at Starfleet Medical when we get there." She squeezed his hand to give him some more reassurance. "And we will be beaming over."

This bit of news worried him.

She knew this too. "The twins know what 'beaming' is now. They won't panic when it happens." She stood with his assistance. And this time the noise that she made was one of pain. "Damn. I feel so useless at the moment." She permitted Jean-Luc to steady her with his arms. "Help me, darling. I need to take a sonic shower before we leave."

It took a bit of doing, but he finally maneuvered Beverly into the sonic shower stall, and slipped the caftan off of her. Beverly sat propped up on a tall stool as the sonic shower did its work. Jean-Luc went in search of loose leggings and slippers. After she finished her shower, he helped her dress. Then he looked about the bathroom as if going through a mental check list. "Can you think of anything else that we need to do before we leave?"

"You could brush my hair and put it in a pony tail," she remarked as she looked about the bathroomas well, and then checked out the dressing room. She lifted a fine gold chain off of her neck. "Maybe you should put my wedding rings into the safe as well." For with the edema that came with the latter stages of pregnancy, Beverly had not been able to wear her engagement or wedding ring during the past few months on her left hand. Instead, she had the rings hanging on a chain around her neck.

Ably doing what she had requested of him, Jean-Luc fixed her hair and then put her rings in the wall safe in the dressing room. Then he put ballet type rose colored slippers on her feet, pulled her into a standing position and softly asked, "Are you ready?"

"No. But I guess we have to go anyway." She nodded toward the nursery door. "Let's go that away." Holding tightly on to her husband's arm, they walked into the nursery and looked about. "The next time we are in this room, it will be with our babies, Jean-Luc." Tears began to stream down her face.

Inwardly sighing and fighting back his own surge of tears, Jean-Luc reached into his khaki slacks and pulled out a handkerchief. He'd become accustomed to Beverly's odd bouts of crying. "I don't suppose you'd care to rethink our becoming parents…" he teased.

She swatted him. "Too late, now."

"What will be, will be." He pressed his palm against her abdomen, wincing as he felt how active they were at the moment. "They are excited too."

"Yes. Alex and Anna want to see the world." she agreed.

"_Anna_?"

"Yes. Though _your_ daughter and I are debating whether it is to be a diminutive of _De-anna _or_ Lwax-ana…" _She patted his hand. "_Your_ daughter is a stubborn little girl. She is still insisting on _Lwaxana_."

As they slowly walked down the hallway toward the elevator, he too-casually asked, "What do you mean by _my_ daughter? I have always been given the impression that adamantine stubbornness is a _Howard _family trait."

Beverly snorted at this bald faced statement. But she nobly refrained from responding for they had just reached the elevator, and her babies were suddenly becoming even more active.

"Cesarean, I think," Beverly gasped between their kicks to her rib cage.

Suddenly Beverly found herself floating on a pink cloud inside of the elevator. It felt like she was in a one third gravity chamber.

"Mustn't distress the little mummy, mustn't one," Q cooed as he appeared standing next to Beverly. He was dressed in surgical hospital scrubs, which just so happened to be the same color as her caftan.

"Normally, I'd yell at you, Q." Beverly gasped. And the she grabbed his collar, and pulled his head closer to hers. She kissed his cheek and patted his chest. "But for your thoughtfulness, I do thank you." She leaned back against the elevator wall. "Bless you for doing this for me." She floated lower, resting on a conforming pink cloud pallet. Jean-Luc could tell by the way that Beverly was breathing more easily, that the cloud had to be enveloping Beverly in a much lighter gravity.

Q was flustered by her words and actions. He wasn't exactly used to such gratitude from any Picard. "Why thank you, I think." Then Q elbowed Jean-Luc. "Aren't you supposed to push a button or something to get this primitive method of transportation to move?" His eyes lighted up. "Or, shall I do it?" he asked with glee.

Jean-Luc instinctively shuddered. But instead of pushing a floor button, Jean-Luc tightened his control over his inclinations when it came to being in Q's presence, and firmly stated, "Transporter Room, Sub-level three."

As she felt the elevator move, Beverly casually interrogated the family imp. "What are you doing here, Q?"

"Why, you didn't think that I'd miss the big event now did you?" With that, he almost rested his head on her tummy and whispered, "Kootchie-coo, Little Ones. Your fairy godfather is here!"

Jean-Luc was about to query the phrase '_fairy godfather_', when suddenly the elevator shook. And rumbled And then it stopped moving. They were stuck between floors. The lights went out and for a moment; it was completely dark. _And for a brief millisecond, Jean-Luc felt like panicking._ And then the emergency lighting system kicked in and flooded the elevator in a brownish orange light.

He focused his fear on the most likely source of danger. "Q, this isn't funny!" Jean-Luc Picard yelled; his anger and frustrations were threatening to burst forth.

"Oh, I don't know. It has certain comedic elements."

This voice came from the corner behind him. It flushed over him like a bucket of ice cold water flung over one's head.

Whirling about, Jean-Luc found himself face-to-face with Guinan and immediately calmed down a bit. He wasn't even going to ask what she was doing in the elevator. He was just grateful to see the lady. For if she had beamed in, that meant that Beverly could beam out.

"I am not in labor - yet," Beverly dryly observed even as Q helped lower her down to the floor of the now stationery elevator. She found herself resting comfortably.

Jean-Luc whirled about again, torn between being irritated with the Howard sense of humor, and being grateful that Beverly still had enough energy to demonstrate her Howard sense of humor. He knelt down next to his wife. "You're not in any pain?"

Guinan chuckled, pointing out, "That's a different question from being in labor."

Jean-Luc ignored her comment. He went to the elevator control panel and pulled it open. He hit the emergency button. Nothing happened.

Everyone in the elevator heard what he'd cursed. _Baiser…_

Beverly tried to recall if she'd every heard Jean-Luc use that word as a curse word before. _Usually, when he said 'baise moi' to her, they were about to make passionate love…_

"Now what?" He glanced about the panel. He didn't seem to have noticed that Q's jaw had dropped a little bit over the fact that his perfect Starfleet officer had just uttered a gutter-based curse word. "Q, if you don't mind, could you provide us with a little light?"

"Of course, _mon amiral." _The overhead lights glowed on.

Jean-Luc poked a couple of buttons. "Why aren't they answering?" His frustration was evident.

"Maybe they're a little busy - what with the earthquake and everything," Guinan observed.

"Earthquake?" Jean-Luc's voice was full of incredulous belief. _That such an event would dare to occur as he was taking Beverly to the hospital…_

"Earthquakes still happen now and then on Earth, Jean-Luc," Guinan calmly responded. "Not like the ones that they had in the old days before mankind figured out how to balance the tectonic plate pressures, but still, there are pressure adjustments now and then."

He turned his exasperated glare on his old friend. "But they are supposed to warn us when such an adjustment is made!"

"They probably did. You just had your mind focused on other things. Perfectly understandable that you wouldn't notice a notice." Her voice was very soothing at the moment.

He bopped his comm badge on the shoulder of his tan shirt.

Nothing happened.

"Jean-Luc…" Guinan's voice bordered on the soporific.

Her attitude wasn't working on him. "What?" he barked.

"Didn't get your beauty sleep last night, did you?" Q observed; at the moment he was amused with Guinan's torturing of Jean-Luc.

Guinan continued speaking in her most annoying, soothing tone of voice. "You're in a temporary security zone, remember? Admiral Winston Holt Wiley is in residence, so there is a dampening field in place."

"But that restriction is not supposed to be applied to me!" Admiral Jean-Luc Picard roared.

"When you can, go yell at Mildred about it." Guinan placidly replied.

"Anybody in there?" a very cheerful voice asked, interrupting this conversation. It came from up above.

"Yes!" Q just as cheerfully responded.

A moment later, the escape hatch at the top of the elevator swung open and Wesley dropped down into the elevator.

"I think I finally understand the definition of what _Grand Central Station _means," Q mumbled not quite to himself.

Wesley fell to his knees in front of his mother. "Mom! Are you all right?" He ignored the pink stuff floating about.

"So far, so good." She was doing her best not to laugh out loud in order not to irritate Jean-Luc some more. But she was having a hard time controlling herself.

"Wesley! What's going on?" Jean-Luc demanded to know.

"The earthquake was a bit stronger than predicted," the cadet explained. "Unfortunately the house's back-up power system was in the midst of being overhauled which is why it didn't kick in when the main power was disrupted."

"Who ordered that?" an affronted Jean-Luc asked as he tried to consider who could have been so foolish as to have ordered such a thing during Beverly's pregnancy. He certainly had not - _had he?_

Hearing a tone to Jean-Luc's voice that Wesley recognized from his _Enterprise_ days, Wesley immediately donned his super-efficient ensign-to-cadet mien. "I believe that Admiral Winston Holt Wiley decided that the back-up power system wasn't up to his standards so he ordered it fixed. It was supposed to be ready by this morning. I guess that the earthquake delayed the completion a bit."

"Was there any damage?" Beverly interjected. At the moment, she was more concerned about her house than herself.

"A few things fell in the kitchen. I'm not sure what else," Wesley explained to his mother. "I am sure that Mrs. Krebs will have her little lists of damage reports all ready for review in a few hours."

"Well that is all well and good, Wesley. But what about getting us out of here? Your mother is supposed to be at Starfleet Medical!" Jean-Luc snapped.

Wesley decided that his step-father was beginning to sound snarky. He wisely refrained from grinning at a man who was about to reach the end of his emotional rope.

"_Yahoooo-ooo!"_

"_Perfect!" _Jean-Luc and Guinan moaned simultaneously. _Jean-Luc could only wonder what sins it was that he had committed in a past life to cause him in this life, to be punished so…_

"Anybody down there?" The worry in Lwaxana's voice was quite evident.

"We're all here," Beverly called back, letting some of her mirth show.

Jean-Luc nobly refrained from glaring at his bride.

A few people were surprised when they heard a thud on the roof of the elevator. Jean-Luc was not for he had learned never to put anything past Lwaxana - including dropping down onto the ceiling of a stuck elevator.

"That's my Lwaxana," Q chortled. "Once she dumps _Whiney_, I'll make her my goddess!" he announced to one and all.

"Fat chance that will ever happen," Guinan too-sweetly stated. "The lady has taste." What kind of taste, Guinan failed to mention out loud.

"Well, somebody help me down!" Lwaxana imperiously ordered as she sat on the edge of the trap door, with her legs dangling downward.

"Oh, let me," Q responded with a glowing look in his eye. He positioned himself beneath the lady, automatically appreciating the darling little sequined purple pumps that she was wearing. As well as wondering what she might be wearing underneath her voluminous lavender skirt. Peering upwards he was not able to discern much beyond her custom made shoes.

Jean-Luc jerked his head at Wesley. The cadet in turn, stood behind Q to help him catch the lady just in cast Q needed some help.

A moment later, Q had his arms full, and he was not inclined to let the lady go. The lady slide down the full length of his body until her feet touched the floor. But he still did not let the lady go.

"At least someone is glad to see me." Ever the coquette, Lwaxana batted her eyelids at Q as she relished the strength of his arms. _Now and then, Lwaxana could actually say a few good things about this member of the Continuum.._.

"Put her down, Q," Guinan politely warned.

"Why?" he countered as he still held Lwaxana in his arms, in spite of the lady's vigorous squirming. Though no one was quite positive that Lwaxana was trying to actually break away from Q's embrace.

"She'll end up squishing you," Guinan observed.

"And you don't think that I'd enjoy that?" Q volleyed back.

Wesley reached over and pulled Lwaxana out of Q's arms since the imperious member of the Continuum was somewhat distracted with his ongoing battle with Guinan.

"Oh, my precious Beverly! I've come to you in your hour of need!" Lwaxana moaned as she flung herself on top of Beverly's legs.

"I'm not in _need_, just yet," Beverly tartly observed as she tried to shift her legs. Lwaxana was pressing against her at an awkward angle.

Jean-Luc immediately felt Beverly's consternation. "What is it, _mon coeur,"_ he quickly asked as he moved to his lady's side to hold her hand.

The scent of Lwaxana's overpoweringly floral perfume was beginning to nauseate her. "Jean-Luc, do you think it just might be possible to get me out of here, somehow?" Beverly acerbically asked even as she moved her body as far away from Lwaxana's scent as she could.

"Whatever you wish, oh mother to my godchildren!" Q blithely announced. He snapped his fingers.

Nothing happened.

For a moment, this member of the Continuum was stunned into silence. "What?" he managed to croak out.

"Uh-oh," Guinan mumbled.

Everyone in the elevator heard those words anyway.

"Guinan. What have you done!" rasped Q.

"Nothing," she snapped back.

Q snapped his fingers again. And again, nothing happened. "My powers - what's happened to them!" he wailed.

"You brought this on yourself, Q!" Guinan answered back having figured out the probable cause of Q's loss of powers - _a more powerful Q_.

"What did I do? I'm only trying to help the mother of my godchildren!" Q sounded indignant. "I haven't broken any of the rules lately!"

Jean-Luc, in the meantime, ignored Q. "Guinan, would your please get Beverly out of here?" For he was sensing something else besides amusement in his very pregnant bride.

Guinan raised a hairless eyebrow. This was the first time - ever - that Jean-Luc had deliberately referenced her own exceptional powers. But before she could respond, Q grabbed her shoulders and shook her. Guinan's trapezoid form plum colored hat flopped back and forth.

A moment later, Q found himself on the floor of the elevator with Guinan's boot pressing against his throat. Her boots were low heeled. But they did have barbed spurs to the heels. Just a little push on the spur could inflict considerable pain. "You do have a death wish, don't you, Q?" she calmly asked in spite of having to keep a very agitated Q forced down onto the floor.

"Guinan! Tell me what's happening!" Q demanded. He did not hide the panic in his voice.

"If it is what I suspect it to be, I think that my uncle may have just come for a visit. He promised that he'd help with the twins," Guinan casually replied.

"Terkim?" Beverly chirped up from the corner.

Jean-Luc noted that Q had immediately gone from belligerent and scared to terrified and panic-stricken when he'd heard the name of Guinan's uncle.

"Fancy that. For the first time in his very long life, my Uncle Terkim has shown up on time. Definitely one for the history books," Guinan mused, well aware of what her words were doing to the quivering mass still being pressed to the floor by her boot.

But Jean-Luc was concerned only about one thing. And that was Beverly. He turned toward his step-son. "Wesley, climb back out of here and inform security of the situation. If they cannot get power to this lift immediately, then they should figure out a way to beam Beverly out of here." He gave his step-son a boost up through the escape door.

"But what about me?" Q whined. "I've got to get away from here!"

Jean-Luc peered down at him. "Something tells me that some of your old sins are about to catch up with you. And while normally, I might find such an event to be interesting - perhaps even entertaining - right now it doesn't signify. At this moment, _**you don't matter to me! Only Beverly does!**_ _So, Q, if you cannot help me with Beverly, then I most sincerely suggest that you __**shut up. And get out of my way!**_"

Q had just enough common sense to realize just how much Jean-Luc had been tried so far, this morning. The man was speaking with heartfelt, deadly earnestness. Q then did something that most who knew him would have thought was an impossibility. Q shut up.

"Oh my!" exclaim Lwaxana as she touched Beverly's tummy.

"What?" a beleaguered Jean-Luc asked.

"The twins want to come out and see what all the fuss is about." Lwaxana lovingly caressed Beverly's abdomen. "Oh my dear, you've got a mother's worst curse bestowed upon you, Beverly. Your twins are _curious._"

It took a great deal of control in order for Jean-Luc to calmly ask, "Are you trying to tell me that you think that Beverly is going into labor?"

Beverly suddenly gasped. And then grimaced.

Jean-Luc's face suddenly paled as this new pain, unknown pain echoed through him.

"Is that a sufficient response to your question?" Lwaxana simply asked as she watched him blanch.

Jean-Luc had enough strength to glare at the Betazed even as he moved over to his bride's side. "Tell me what I can do?"

"Get me out of here?" Beverly calmly suggested as the pain receded.

"This is an odd place to hold a meeting with a pregnant woman going into labor," a strange voice announced from the only unoccupied corner of the elevator.

Everyone turned to look at the speaker. He was a tall man. A big man. A man with wiry, very long grey hair. He was a very hairy man which was apparent because of the open vee-neck virulent purple sleeveless shirt that he was wearing. Along with what appeared to be a kilt about his hips. His arms were just as furry as his chest.

Jean-Luc noticed the man's Roman style, laced up sandals. He was not that surprised to see a bunch of very hairy toes.

"Please don't kill me," Q whimpered. He trembled on the floor in fear.

Beverly brightly smiled over at the tall man liking the way that he smiled at her. "I take it that you must be the legendary Uncle Terkim. I'm Beverly Picard."

"A pleasure to meet you, my lady admiral. Guinan has told me so very much about you." With an elegant flourish, he bowed before Beverly. He clasped Beverly's hand and pressed a lingering kiss against her knuckles. "But for once, Guinan's description of you did not do you justice." He stood up straight. And then he glanced over at his niece. "You're looking well, my nunchkin."

"Cut the chit-chat, Uncle Terkim. Beverly is going into labor."

Terkim's smile was dazzling. He glanced at everyone about the pregnant lady. "Then I shall escort you to the hospital, my lady admiral," Terkim jovially replied. He leaned down and touched her abdomen for a few moments. "Ah yes, the babes wish to come out soon." He glanced over at Lwaxana, nodding in her direction. "We are all here to help you."

For the first time in quite a few minutes, Jean-Luc relaxed - just a little bit.

Terkim glanced down at the Q cowering on the floor. When he spoke, his voice was soft, but no one denied the threats that were behind his words." And don't think that I've forgotten about you, you little Minorian blood slug. But, first things, first. Life before death." With this ominous statement, he levitated Beverly into his arms, snapped his fingers with considerable flourish, and disappeared.

A bewildered Jean-Luc looked over at Guinan. He had not anticipated Beverly leaving without him.

"Uncle Terkim, you forgot someone."

Jean-Luc twinkled for a split second and then disappeared too.

Q sat up, brushing off his clothing. "Madame Ambassador…"

"Yes, Q?" Lwaxana was trying to figure out everything that had happened. _ And who was that dynamic man..._

"Does Betazed grant amnesty to beings who are in danger of being persecuted?" Q shuddered. "Severely endangered? Tortured?"

"Is this danger political?" Lwaxana casually asked as she tried to figure out what had just happened. And how she was going to get out of this stuck elevator.

"It's criminal," Guinan replied as she maliciously eyed Q. After the birth of the Picard babies, Guinan anticipated a rollicking good soap opera of the Continuum kind.

Just then, the power was restored to the elevator. It jerked. And then they all ended up at the transporter pad where they beamed directly over to Starfleet Medical.


	5. Chapter 5: Aunt-icipation

_**De-Tached: Story 5: Life with Beverly**_

_**Chapter 5: Aunt-icipation…**_

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

Jean-Luc Picard had experienced many unusual things throughout his long life. Extraordinary things. Wonderful things. Inspiring things. But sharing labor pains with his wife as they entered Starfleet Medical's obstetrics ward was an entirely new category of 'things' for him. He would don his most noble façade for Beverly. And be for her whatever she wanted, needed or wished of him as the hour neared of her giving birth. _But sharing labor pains?_ It was something that in his heart-of-hearts he really wished that he could have avoided.

"You're in transition," he thought he heard Norah Bolt say to his wife. "8 cm. Your water broke." A sudden strong pain radiated through his lower back. _Spiking. Agonizing… _It overwhelmed everything else he was feeling or hearing. Between trying to pace his gasps for breath he thought: _Women went through this again and again? They most definitely were not the weaker sex…_

Both admirals were on gurneys floating down corridors, being transported to a private birthing room at Starfleet Medical.

He felt the pain ebb, momentarily washing away from him. He felt exhausted. And he knew that this ordeal had only just begun. "The babies?" he croaked out to the placid looking nurse who was walking next to him. She guided him into the birthing room, prepping him.

His eyes wandered about absentmindedly noting the undulating walls with their peaceful tones of ocean blues and greens in abstract waves. There was an occasional sighting of soaring birds or bright stars here and there, above the flowing water motif. Later on, Jean-Luc would come to realize that those images were designed to give the mother something to focus upon.

Jean-Luc Picard refused to panic. Beverly needed him.

His attendant seemed to know exactly what to say to him in order to calm him down. "They're fine. And they are coming fast, too." She had a pleasant, reassuring smile and a soothing voice. She patted the back of his hand that was clutching the thin baby blue blanket that was covering him. And so he believed her. He closed his eyes as he waited for another intense back pain to hit him. At the moment, he was not able to judge their frequency. For a time, he felt the nurse wipe his brow even as he considered the wisdom of bracing himself for what was to come.

A moment later he felt himself being moved over to a monitored bed. He opened his eyes and was greeted by the sight of a widely grinning Captain Doctor Kate Pulaski. _She looked like the cat that had caught the proverbial canary. _For a woman whose patient was in labor, she seemed very pleased with herself.

"Circumstances - and Beverly - have conspired for this to be a natural childbirth," she declared to her former captain. She watched as a wave of pain continued to traverse through this man. She waited until it passed away before speaking some more. "This is going to be fun," she stated, not quite to herself.

When he opened his eyes, the sight that greeted him again was that of a smug Kate Pulaski. She had patiently waited out this last contraction before tormenting him with her continuing presence. "Beverly is Norah's patient - not mine. I'm just observing. And to be here to lend a hand if needs be." With the way that she said these words, Picard did not need to be a Betazed to know that she was not exactly sympathetic to his plight. But at least she wasn't hovering. _He hated hovering._

"There are a lot of doctors who are greatly interested in Beverly giving birth," Dr. Pulaski casually informed her patient. Before he could even form an appropriate response, she continued. "They all are _very_ curious about your sharing the birthing experience with Beverly. Not that they couldn't get the same medical and telepathic information if they had some Betazoid parents as patients. Still, you and Beverly are the first, official, one hundred percent human couple going through a 'shared' birthing experience."

Jean-Luc decided that Kate Pulaski was doing a lousy job of hiding her satisfaction over his situation.

She continued. "Oh well, one must bow to the needs of scientific curiosity for the benefit of mankind…"

Jean-Luc just knew that there was an evil glint in Kate Pulaski's eyes. The lady was delighting in this unique situation. _She wanted to see him squirm…_

She continued to annoy him. "And you'd be correct, Jean-Luc, in assuming that the majority of the doctors that are interested in your wife's shared pregnancy with you are women - and _mothers_." Kate inspected all of his monitors and then compared them to what she was seeing on Beverly's med boards. She nodded as if pleased with what she was noting down on her padd. "Beverly and the babies - they are fine. Everything - even you - is fine," she stated. She dropped her officious air as she spoke to him for she was not quite willing to torture him over what was really the important stuff. Kate was enjoying herself, but she was not a malicious woman. Still, she just couldn't help herself when it came to pompous admirals - and for all of his self-deprecation, Jean-Luc Picard could be described as '_pompous_' at times. "Who knows. You might be the forerunner of an evolutionary forward step for all mankind. One can only hope." She tapped something into her padd. "I'm sure that I speak for all womankind when I say that _it's long overdue._ Men paying for their pleasure now, just as women have had to endure during the millennia. What a novel - and fair - conceit."

He groaned as another wave of pain rolled across his back. When it had subsided, he turned his head in Beverly's direction. But his eyes could not focus on the display boards above her bed. He could only see his wife. "Beverly…"

Kate's expression softened. "She's doing fine, Jean-Luc. And if it gets to be too much for her, we will do something about it."

"Too late for a Caesarean?" he gasped.

"It was too late before she left your house," Kate tartly replied. "Somehow - or someone - was deliberately masking her pain. She didn't know how far along she was in transition until she got to Medical. She should have come in at 4 cm. Instead she came in at 8 cm."

"But she scanned herself…"

"Did she, now? And she didn't catch it? She wouldn't have been that out of it - not Beverly. Interesting." Kate pursed her lips. And considered some possibilities. "I wonder if Q was interfering?"

"I was _not_!" a voice haughtily declared next to Picard's ear. "I would have never done anything that might endanger the health of my godchildren - not to mention the woman I adore from afar."

Kate eyed the imp. "Q, if you truly meant what you just said, then please, get out of here. Go to the waiting room and annoy the people there. I'm sure that they will enjoy it. Do anything else but hang around this room!"

"But I want to see!"

"Trust me - Beverly does not want you to _see_," Kate sarcastically stated. "And if you do _see,_ well then, if I were you I'd start dreading what Beverly will do to you when she finds out that you did _see_. This is the kind of thing that no woman would forgive or forget."

"But…," Q argued.

"Giving birth isn't pretty, Q." Kate glanced down at the admiral. "The only reason that Jean-Luc is here is because thanks to the KesPrytt, he has to be here. Otherwise, I think that he'd rather be in the waiting room."

"No… I wouldn't…" Jean-Luc weakly protested.

Kate snorted.

Jean-Luc got the distinct impression that Kate didn't believe his protestation. _But he wanted to be there for Beverly… It didn't matter if they were psychically joined or not…_

Jean-Luc lifted his hand in Q's direction. Q automatically grasped it. "_Please go_, Q."

Considering that Q could count the number of times that Jean-Luc Picard had said '_please_' to him and really meant it on one big toe, Q nodded in acceptance. And then he blinked. And vanished.

"You sure that is your _real_ Q? He doesn't seem so fearsome to me," Kate observed as she continuously kept monitoring her padd and the bed monitors.

"Please don't say that to him," Jean-Luc warned. "I wouldn't want even you to be subject to his pettiness as he proves otherwise to you…"

"You must be feeling better if you can dip into your well of sarcasm," Kate observed as she walked away from his bed to join Dr. Bolt.

"Jean-Luc…"

He heard his wife's cry. It was a struggle, but Jean-Luc finally sat up and was able to look over at Beverly. A moment later he was on his feet, stumbling toward his wife. When he reached her, he grabbed her hand, fell to his knees and whispered, _"Mon coeur…"_

"…_you bastard! I will never let you…"_

Dr. Bolt looked over and nodded at an attendant. Suddenly Jean-Luc found himself being lifted up, and placed back on top of his bed, which had just been moved much, much closer to Beverly's bed. "They're joined in the head, so they might as well be joined in the hand," Norah flatly stated as the attendant tried to make Jean-Luc more comfortable. And still be within an arm's reach of Beverly.

"_Mon coeur…"_

She jerked his hand. For a moment the pain was gone. "Thank you," Beverly cried, looking over at her beloved in desperation. Her words were rushed. "Jean-Luc, _I love you… I will always love you…" _Then she felt another contraction forming. It crested. "F…." A rather pithy gutter curse word was the next word that she spoke.

"Breathe!" Jean-Luc managed to gasp as he shared this much stronger contraction with her. He ignored the fact that she was crushing his fingers with her grip.

For a moment, she was lucid. She glared at her doctor.

The doctor checked something and she then announced, "10 cm."

Before Norah Bolt could say anything else, Beverly screamed, "I know, I know. Don't push." She gasped for air, squeezed Jean-Luc's hand even harder, then croaked, "I want an epidural block!"

"We'll see," Kate Pulaski soothingly said.

Beverly glared at the woman and said something in Klingonese. Jean-Luc Picard could tell by Kate's reaction that Beverly had not said '_thank you_' to her doctors. If he'd translated her words correctly, Beverly was suggesting that if he ever touched her again, she would turn a portion of his anatomy into _Fek'lhr's_ _shriveled balls…_

The pain momentarily ebbed for both of them. The pressure on Beverly's abdomen decreased.

Dr. Pulaski and Dr. Bolt studied their patients. "Doctors do make the most annoying patients, don't you think so, Dr. Bolt?" Kate casually asked, even as her eyes noted every new detail. Dr. Bolt was doing the same. That lady's response was only to nod her head in agreement. "Of course, no one holds a candle to former starship captains. They're in a category all by themselves. Those arrogant s.o.b.'s..." Both doctors silently kept checking and comparing notes. And both doctors were making small talk as if to convince Jean-Luc and Beverly that whatever was occurring was well within the realm of 'normal'.

Jean-Luc suddenly gleaned what Kate and Norah were doing_. There was something odd occurring…_

As if she were reading his mind, Kate Pulaski sent Jean-Luc a warning glance, and slightly shook her head.

"Dr. Pulaski," Jean-Luc gasped as he tried to regroup his mental faculties, searching for something totally inane to discuss, "what did I ever do to get you so pissed at me?"

"You put protocol before patients," she sweetly answered back even as she exchanged another concerned glance with Norah Bolt. "And that is a no-no in my book."

"I was unaware that I was doing so at the time," he wearily argued. "It was an unintentional error."

"I take it that you're going to stick with that story," Kate volleyed back.

A minute later, he was ignoring whatever it was that Kate Pulaski was saying as another, much stronger wave of pain roiled through him.

Beverly was screaming wildly now. And cursing - in at least four languages that her spouse could identify though not necessarily translate. Jean-Luc was impressed by what his spouse was yelling. He did not know that she knew such words and in such differing languages. Right now she was saying something about how it would be a cold day on an H class planet before she'd ever let her rutting targ of a husband ever touch her again.

Jean-Luc Picard just repeatedly yelled at the top of his lungs, "_Merde!" as the pain hit him multiple times, even as he silently agreed with his wife…_

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

"Q, stop your pacing!" Lwaxana imperially ordered.

"How can I stop? I've never been a godfather before!" he argued. "Maybe I should turn myself into a Mislodian fly and go see what's going on in there!" He pointed to the birthing room behind the swinging grey doors.

"I wouldn't, if I were you," Terkim coolly said. "If you did turn yourself into a fly, I might be inclined to keep you that way. _And I've got a great big swatter that I've been dieing to use…" _Terkim forced himself to sit down on a bilious blue upholstered arm chair. And then he took a deep breath and muttered a few timeless mantras before he spoke again. _"_And right now, I do not need that kind of temptation from you, Q." He shook his head; scraggy curls bounced. "It must be the pregnancy hormones that caused Beverly Picard to _like_ you. I will do nothing to upset the lady at this moment." He just had to add, "But once the babies are born…"

Q royally sniffed in Terkim's direction. The El Aurelian giant was not impressed in the slightest.

Q returned to pacing, though he did not go near anywhere near the blue and green checked sofa where Lwaxana was sitting in the fairly large waiting room. Q looked about the room. And studied it. Though he was fairly sure that the décor was aesthetically pleasing to some soulless design committee, to him the room was on a par with the ambiance of a Turkanian vilerbeast dung pit. The room's only saving grace was that the stink wasn't as bad. "I can do better than this," he declared to no one in particular. He snapped his fingers. And suddenly, everyone was reclining on ruby silk upholstered down-filled chaise lounges. Very colorful tapestries now adorned the walls, depicting scenes demonstrating how one gets a female humanoid pregnant in rather graphic detail. There were graceful, semi-scantily clad serving girls offering drinks and delicacies on ornate silver trays. An appetizing buffet was on display in one corner. A string quarter appeared in another corner playing Mozart.

Not to be outdone by such a lesser Q, Terkim snapped his fingers. "Warnog, anyone?" He motioned toward his manservant to start pouring the flaming liquid into silver tankards and then distribute them.

It was at this moment that Admiral Winston Holt Wiley, the Fleet Admiral of Starfleet Command, ran into the room, roaring, "How's Beverly?" He abruptly stopped. And he looked around, especially when a very tall, hairy man shoved a tankard of something that smelled decidedly alcoholic directly under his nose. He sniffed the drink again and decided that it was worth tasting. "Hmmm, Beverly really did a lot of improvements the short time she was CMO," he observed as he took in the food, the wall hangings and the serving girls who weren't wearing all that much. He approved of these changes. "How is the mother of my godchildren doing?" he asked Terkim since the man was still standing squarely in front of him holding the tankard.

"Based on the fact that they haven't called in the cavalry yet, I would imagine that things are just fine." Terkim jerked his head toward another sofa where Mildred, Ryllis and Guinan were sitting. Ryllis was sipping some tea. Mildred and Guinan were drinking from flaming steins. Terkim was impressed that the human female knew how to drink flaming warnog without burning her nose. But then, he'd heard a lot about Winston Holt Wiley's cousin Mildred. Apparently some of the rumors that he had been told were actually factual. Which, considering that Guinan was his main source of information, was quite surprising indeed. And the notion that she was also Guinan's friend told Terkim quite a bit more about the nature of this lady. _And he was intrigued._

At this moment Robert and Marie entered. Mildred went to them and hugged Marie and then filled them in with everything that she knew. Robert had an off-putting air about him that discouraged hugs, so of course Mildred did hug him. Rene in the meantime just looked around the room wide-eyed with curiosity. He found the tapestries to be of particular interest.

Guinan delivered a pointy elbow to Q's ribs. "What?" Guinan gave Q one of her death glares. "The boy is French for heaven's sake There's nothing up there he cannot find in the family's library!" She elbowed Q again. The scenes depicted on the tapestries suddenly became fairy tale depictions - much to Winston Holt Wiley's disappointment.

Suddenly, Ryllis stood as if her internal warning system had just dinged. "It's time, ladies." She picked up a pewter flask and nodded at Lwaxana. "You handle the Papa. Guinan and I will handle the babies."

Lwaxana stood and emphatically shook her head. "No! Little Lwaxana wants _me_ to guide her!"

Mildred muttered to herself, "They did _not_ name the girl Lwaxana..."

This was not a battle that Ryllis had to win with the Ambassadress. She backed off.

"I'll take care of Picard," Guinan softly stated. "I've been doing so for decades. I'm the least likely person to scare the living daylights out of him as Beverly gives birth."

Ryllis paused for a moment, studied the woman who had a penchant for long robes, noticed how conservatively dressed the El Aurian was in a blue outfit today, contrasted Guinan's attire with the eye-searing gittering tangerine ensemble that Lwaxana was wearing, and nodded her agreement. "I'd best handle the boy, then. He's a feisty one."

Wesley stepped up. Concern for his mother was plainly etched on his visage. "Is there anything that I can do?"

"Drink." Winston Holt Wiley handed the cadet his flaming tankard.

Wesley sat back down, next to Q.

"I'll give Jean-Luc the Betazed wine," Guinan announced as she walked over to the sliding doors that led into the birthing area. "Well, we'd best go change and get sanitized or whatever it is that they want us to do in there." She eyed Lwaxana sternly, and warned, "Lwaxana... Leave the gong and the cymbals - behind."

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

Captain Will Riker did not need to be an empath or a telepath to know that his _Imzadi_ was in a very good mood. For she had waltzed onto the bridge with a very big smile on her face, willing to share her bright spirits with every person on the bridge of the _Enterprise._

"What's put you in such a good mood this morning?" Will just had to ask as Deanna settled into her chair, even as the panels of her blue uniform dress swirled about her before draping across the counsellor's chair.

"Beverly's gone into labor," Deanna announced with glee.

Will cracked a very big grin. "Great. I can only imagine how Jean-Luc Picard is dealing with this."

Knowing that Will did not know all the details of Beverly's pregnancy, all Deanna could say was, "You don't know the half of it." She sent one of her better _mystery-thy-name-is-woman _smiles in her _Imzadi's_ direction.

Will knew there was something going on about the Picard pregnancy. Something significant. He'd picked that much up at least, during the _Enterprise's _refitting at Utopia Planetia, but he hadn't a clue as to exactly whatever it was, was. He grumbled to himself. Deanna had been keeping things from him and doing this sort of thing to him rather frequently as of late. And he was not in a mood to ask her.

"Wesley will keep me posted," Deanna added. She was enjoying herself. And from what she could sense in her link with her mother, her mother was enjoying herself too._ As for what she was sensing from Will, well, she was trying not to smile too much around him. He already was suspicious…_

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**


	6. Chapter 6: They're Heeerre

_**A.N.:** The momentous occasion has arrived. I hope that you enjoy this for I certainly did as I was writing it. For of course, nothing that Jean-Luc and Beverly do will ever be merely simple..._

_**De-Tached: Story 5: Life with Beverly**_

_**Chapter 6: They're Here…**_

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

Guinan noted how calm all the doctors and nurses were when the baby birthing entourage processed into the birthing room. She mentally sent kudos to Dr. Bolt and Dr. Pulaski for preparing their staff for unlikely events. Then she thought about it some more. This staff had probably seen screaming grandparents, arguing siblings, bawling children, chanting spiritual advisors or shamans, hysterical husbands and more, depending upon the cultural requirements of the mother, crowding into a birthing room to see the miracle and the messiness. So a senior Betazed Ambassador, her servant who had just beamed into the room, a Betazed baby specialist, an El Aurian and Winston Holt Wiley's legendary cousin were maybe not all that strange of a sight. That is, not until Lwaxana Troi-Wiley walked over to Beverly. Even in her pink scrubs the medical staff knew that whomsoever this was, and regardless of how she was dressed, this woman was a _presence_.

Beverly was now making the kind of noise that attracted everyone's attention. She was an unknown Beverly - a decidedly agitated, hollering and borderline-hysterical Beverly. Lwaxana soothingly suggested, "Are you sure that you don't want a gong being bonged? When I had my daughters, I found it to be most efficacious with their deliveries. It would lend a certain calming air to the arrival of your babies…" She _tchted-tchted _as she looked around the birthing room. "And the superbly gifted way that I play the cymbals most certainly would liven things up around here…"

Beverly rudely interrupted the senior Ambassadress. _**"Get Homm out of here! And do you want to know what you can do with your cymbals?" **_What Beverly said after that to Lwaxana, was somewhat more surprising - at least to those crowding around her, trying to determine just how far 'gone' she was into the delivery. No one who knew Beverly - either as a recently-minted Starfleet admiral, former CMO of Starfleet Medical, loyal friend, honorary relative or beloved lover would have ever imagined that she knew such language much less would be screaming it at the top of her lungs for one and all to hear. It memorably topped her earlier pithy efforts.

Jean-Luc, in between gasps of pain, was starting to wonder about this new side of Beverly that he was hearing. He found it to be rather surprising - a previously undiscovered facet to the gem who was his wife. When he could think, Jean-Luc Picard also realized _that his wife could out-curse him…_

Ryllis correctly assessed the situation, walked over to the beloved husband and would-be father, and shoved a large metal cup up under his nose. "Drink!" she ordered of the man.

At this point in the proceedings, Jean-Luc Picard was willing to obey anyone and everyone who might help hasten the births. He drank. His eyes widened in surprise as he tasted something that resembled spiced mead with a greater alcoholic kick. The warmth from the liquor started in his throat and flowed through his veins even as he swallowed the delicious, smooth drink. Within seconds, he was starting to feel better. Something wonderful was happening to him.

"Drink all of it," Ryllis ordered.

Happy to comply, he finished it off and then rested against his pillows. Within seconds the calming effect of the liquor was transferred over to Beverly from her husband. She abruptly stopped questioning the parentage of Lwaxanna's great great grand-mother and collapsed herself against the upraised back of the birthing bed.

"That's some drink," Kate Pulaski remarked as she observed the blood pressure dropping from its previously higher position for Jean-Luc. Beverly's blood pressure fell a little bit too. And considering the stress that this mother-to-be was in, this was a very welcomed occurrence since the drugs that they'd been giving Beverly were not working too well.

"It's not going to make Beverly drunk, is it?" Dr. Bolt questioned even as she made note of the physical changes in both the mother and the father.

Ryllis responded. Her affect reassured the admiral's physician. "No. Admiral Jean-Luc Picard may get drunk, but Beverly will only calm down a bit because of it."

Both doctors exchanged glances. Norah nodded. "Give Jean-Luc some more," Kate ordered.

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

"This gnocchi with black truffle and sugo sauce is divinely memorable," Ludvig observed as he licked his fork. He had made up a medium plate for himself from the buffet table in the maternity ward waiting room that Q had redecorated. He picked up another fork full of something and tasted it. He became even more excited. "And this rockfish with sun-choke puree is…" He gasped. "Words fail me…"

"Wait until you taste the spanakopita. I brought the gouda and feta cheeses that I used from New Hebetia IV. And then I dusted the spinach with some of my favorite spices from a little planet that I know in the Gamma quadrant. Trust me, you're not going to find the like of them around here!" Q informed Ludvig.

"I didn't know that you were a chef..." Ludvig tasted the flaky phyllo pie whose basic recipe had originated from the Greek Isles. "…Make that such a _great_ chef…"

"Well," Q charmingly admitted, "I didn't exactly cook it. I did what Q's always do when they want something special and are in the mood to dine…"

"But it takes a supreme epicurean chef to have the vision and the imagination to create such sublime food as this…"

"Oh Ludvig, you flatter me." Q actually did blush. It was rare that any humanoid praised him this enthusiastically when it was not being coerced into doing so. So Q graciously added, "You're such a perceptive chef." He preened and mused, "Maybe I'll bestow a favor and let you peak at a recipe or two…"

Lieutenant Commander S'Rock and Wesley Crusher both rolled their eyes simultaneously - even as Wesley went for his third plate full of food from the buffet.

"Try the chocolate cake, brat," Q ordered for he had noted Wesley's response as well as that of Lieutenant Commander S'Rock. "It's your mother's favorite dessert. She requested that I make it for her often during her pregnancy." Q sensed the chef standing next to him stilling. And feeling in a somewhat benevolent mood, he added, "Next to _your Kladdkaka, _that is, Chef Ludvig…" He turned back to Ludvig. "I've tried your recipe, but I can't seem to get it just right…"

From that moment on, Ludvig considered Q to be a friend.

When Mildred found out about this, she would only query Ludvig's taste in friends…

Commander S'Rock in the meantime, looked a bit paler than usual to Wesley as he sat back down on the chaise lounge, placing his plate on a low marble table in front of him.

"Is something wrong, Commander?"

S'Rock shuddered before his stoic Vulcan mask slipped back into place. "She who is my wife will be undergoing all of this in a few months when our child is born…"

Wesley glanced over at the amiably conversing Q. "Surely not _all_ of this." Having a member of the Continuum attending a birthing had to be a one-in-a-hundred billion decidedly rare occurrence.

"It will be not that far removed from…," He waved a hand about. "…this." S'Rock shuddered. He did not even recognize that he had done this, he was so distraught. Though the only outward sign of his perturbation was the shuddering. "Mrs. Krebs has demanded that she be named the godmother to our child. She who is my wife agreed to this before Cherry even asked for my consul about this matter."

"Go to Vulcan and have the baby there," Wesley suggested as he did try the chocolate cake that Q had recommended. _It really was food for the gods…_

S'Rock abruptly sat back. This was such a simple suggestion that S'Rock was shocked that he had over looked it himself. "She who is my wife has yet to meet my mother, though they have briefly conversed by sub-space…"

Wesley froze. Though he had found Cherry to be friendly enough whenever he breezed through his step-father's offices, he didn't know the lieutenant well enough to judge that she would welcome the presence of a formal Vulcaness mother-in-law with whom she had only briefly spoke, when she was giving birth. And considering some of the _unusual_ things that Wesley's own mother had said and done during the later months of her pregnancy, maybe his suggestion to the Vulcan commander wasn't such a wise idea after all.

"I'd pick a supportive Mildred over a Vulcaness who can't even be bothered to meet the mother of her future grandchildren, any day," Q mumbled through a mouth full of his own cake.

For once, S'Rock did not stiffen like he usually did when in the presence of this particular member of the Continuum. For this Q's words were wise as well. "I shall reflect upon this," S'Rock announced. "And discuss this with she who is my wife."

"On any planet in any universe, _consulting the little woman first is always a wise - and smart - idea,_" Q advised.

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

The Betazoid wine was working. Beverly was calming down. Her blood pressure had dropped a bit more. And even though she was nearing a ten centimeter dilation, the frenzied expression on her perspiration-covered face had calmed somewhat. An attendant patted her brow dry with a cloth.

"Now you can push," Kate Pulaski announced, even as she watched Jean-Luc Picard to see what he was going to do at this stage. The man had a very silly grin on his face as he finished off his third cup of wine. He barely moaned through Beverly's next contraction.

"I'v-ah got to get Roberrr to make some more of this stuff," he announced to the room in general as he collapsed against the upraised back of his hospital bed. He felt a very strong urge to push. Though what he was supposed to push, he wasn't exactly too sure about…

"Turn your head to the right if you want to watch your son come into the world," Mildred advised as she pulled the man over on to his right side to witness the miracle of birth. "It looks like he's coming out at warp speed from here." She had to carefully maneuver the man since not once during this final stage had Jean-Luc - _or was it Beverly? _- relinquished the death grip of their clasped hands.

The next minutes were magical. In spite of his somewhat tipsy state, Jean-Luc would forever remember the moment that his son arrived into this world. The boy had psychically connected with his mother and father as he had come forth. And with Guinan's support, and the Betazoid wine, the baby had only felt the joy and almost none of the pain of his birth. However, that didn't stop the boy from bawling the moment that he could do so. _For Jean-Luc's son just had to announce his arrival to the universe…_

Beverly was sobbing now as she lifted her right arm toward the child.

Norah held up the boy so that his mother could see him even as the birthing staff scanned the baby. Norah smiled. "He's fine, Beverly." She double checked with her staff and the scanners. "And he's in perfect health," she announced even as she looked over at the father. "Do you want to cut the umbilical cord?"

"I don't think that you should let Jean-Luc near a laser scalpel at the moment," Lwaxana tartly observed from the other side of Beverly's bed. "Betazed husbands never do."

"I'll guide his hand," Guinan softly stated as she helped her dear friend to his feet. Somewhat unsteady, but still capable of standing on his own, Jean-Luc stepped over to Beverly as she finally released his hand in order to use both of her arms to hold her son for the very first time. A moment later, with Guinan's help, Jean-Luc cut William Alexander Robert Picard's umbilical cord. And then he caressed his son for the very first time as he gazed in stunned astonishment upon the sight of his son being held by his mother.

Sensing his wife's emotions and then those of his son, for the very first time was overwhelming.

_Shattering. _

_Awe inspiring. _

This was the most perfect moment of joy that Jean-Luc had ever experienced in his life, even as he mutually shared his own feelings with his family. _Not even the first sight of his Enterprise D had inspired in him such exultation…_

Guinan motioned for a chair to be brought over, and Jean-Luc found himself sitting by Beverly's side, even as he watched in fascination, every little breath that his son would take.

Mildred stood behind them, and then leaned over and lightly kissed the top of Jean-Luc's head. She wasn't even trying to disguise the fact that tears were streaming down her face at this sight.

"It's time for the arrival of your daughter," Norah softly announced to her patients. She motioned for a nurse to take the boy away and prepare him.

Even though Beverly knew that this was what had to be done, she felt a great sadness as she handed the nurse her son. She felt bereft for this was the first time that she had ever been physically separated from her son since his conception.

And then, the atmosphere in the birthing room altered.

Jean-Luc was the first to recognize it, for Kate Pulaski had stopped smiling.

_T__his wasn't good… _

"What?" he croaked as fear began to send its tentacles into a grip around his throat.

All the doctors ignored him as they checked the monitors and seemingly came to the same conclusion at the same time.

"Fetal transport," Kate crisply ordered as she prepared Beverly for it.

"What? What's wrong?" Beverly screamed even as she tried to raise herself up by her elbows to turn and look at the monitors herself. What she glimpsed panicked her even as a nurse tried to move the panels out of Beverly's line of sight.

"_Don't. You. Dare_." Beverly's warning was not one that this nurse could ignore. Though she did double check with Dr. Bolt before leaving the monitors untouched.

It was Lwaxana, exuding a saneness and a calmness that only a few of her intimate friends or family would ever even recognize, who stepped up next to Beverly's right hand and gripped it firmly. Lwaxana coolly handling a crisis was a sight to behold. "Anna is very exhausted, Beverly. Birthing is a most tiring business, isn't it, my dear? And our _Little One _really doesn't want to leave her mother just yet…" She squeezed Beverly's hand. "And we cannot permit that, now, can we?"

"It's safer this way," Dr. Bolt readily agreed even as she guided her staff in preparation for the transport.

Jean-Luc didn't question the doctors and their decisions. He only knew what he was sensing from his daughter - she was tired and scared about what was to come. _Everything that was to come… _The only thing that he could do at this moment was to show his daughter his unconditional love for her.

"That's it, Jean-Luc. Reassure our _Little One_. Let her know that there is nothing to fear," Lwaxana soothing crooned, even as she stroked her palm over Beverly's abdomen. Speaking directly to the baby, she murmured, "Come out, come out… Your loved ones are waiting to greet you…" She cooed some more. "Don't be shy, little, _Little One…_ We're waiting for you… We love you…"

Beverly's next contraction was the most painful one yet. Jean-Luc bravely stayed upright, holding his beloved's hand even as the pain tore through him, flaming over every nerve ending.

"Now!" Beverly thought she heard Norah Bolt yell even as she screamed her head off, nearly breaking Jean-Luc's hand as she squashed it.

There was a sound of machines humming. A moment later a baby girl appeared on the bedside transporter.

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

"I wouldn't if I were you," Marie announced as she sat down right next to Lieutenant Commander S'Rock.

He raised as eyebrow.

Marie patted his arm. "Forgive me for intruding, but when it comes to information about being pregnant and then giving birth, wouldn't it make more sense to ask a _mother_?" She cast a knowing eye on her nephew and Q with skepticism. "I know that we do not know each other well, but if I were you, I'd ask Mrs. S'Rock about going to Vulcan to give birth. As I recall she has a very large family here on Earth. I know I wouldn't want to leave them all behind at such a time…"

He had not considered that aspect. Commander S'Rock barely moved even as he internally wailed. He felt that he was now paying the penance for every '_waddle waddle'_ sin that he might have committed against Admiral Beverly.

Uncharacteristically, the Vulcan asked Mrs. Picard for help. "What would you recommend, _Madame_ Picard?"

"Ask your mother to come here. And your father as well, if he is still with us," Marie advised.

"My father is on a deep space mission on board the Vulcan Science Vessel _Sh'Raan. _My mother does not expect him to return to Vulcan for another two-point-four years." He hesitated just for a moment before continuing. "My mother does not care for Earthlings. Her great-great-great grandmother was Ambassador V'Lar," he mentioned as if that were explanation enough for his mother's antipathy to humans.

Q just had to stick his nose into this conversation. "As I recall, Ambassador V'Lar was very friendly - for a Vulcan - with Captain Archer, and especially after she met with T'Pol." Q sighed with pleasure as he recalled T'Pol. And then he remembered what he was about. Q just had to sneer at S'Rock. "And we all know just how much T'Pol _loved_ her humans…"

S'Rock interrupted Q. "Madame Picard. Mister Q. Ambassador V'Lar may have been friendly toward her humans. Her daughter was not. Neither has any other matriarch in my mother's family ancestral line chosen to befriend humans. No one has visited Earth much less articulated a will to do so since Ambassador V'Lar."

"T'Pol...," Uncle Terkim mumbled to himself as he sat in a corner still drinking warnog. The smile on his face indicated that the memory of the Vulcaness was a fond one.

Marie decided that even though he was not expressing it, S'Rock had a woeful look about him. She patted his arm again, as if to give him some more reassurance. "But you came here to Earth. And Starfleet. And look at the wonderful life that you've built for yourself here. Your Cherry is a darling woman. We became friends when we were working together on Beverly's baby shower. I truly enjoyed her company. All should could do was talk about her husband - and what a wonderful man he is…"

"My wife mentioned this?" S'Rock knew Cherry and how she needed little encouragement to chatter. She must have told Madame Picard a great deal.

"Speaking of babies…," Q casually mentioned.

"What?" barked Admiral Wiley who had been shamelessly eavesdropping on S'Rock's conversation with Marie.

He had a smile on his face that would not quit as he anticipated fairy god-fatherhood. Q snapped his fingers and champagne filled flutes suddenly floated in front of everyone in the room.

"They're _heeerreee…," _Q pronounced with glee as he grasped his wine to make a toast.


	7. Chapter 7: They Named the Babies

_**De-Tached: Story 5: Life with Beverly**_

_**Chapter 7: They Named the Babies…**_

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

It was the silence that scared him. The very lack of sound had impressed upon him the deadly seriousness of the situation. _And the lack of contact with his daughter's voice that he'd become so used to sensing within his own mind was no longer there. She was missing. He no longer 'felt' her. _Instinctively, his grip on Beverly's hand tightened.

Oh, his son was loudly wailing in the background. But even though he acknowledged that beautiful noise, he tuned it out, straining and waiting to hear his daughter's voice for the very first time.

As the agonizing seconds passed, everything that Jean-Luc Picard was - a man of science and reason, with his feet firmly rooted in his innate belief - and trust - in the way of the logic of this universe _all vanished._ Now he was simply a father, bargaining with God, praying, and silently pleading with his every breath for the life of his daughter. And being intimately familiar with the cruel ways of this universe, _he was terrified that his daughter would be the one to pay the price for his sins…_

Beverly didn't hide her mute distress from him. She shared his fear. Oh, Beverly automatically cooperated with the nurses about her bedside. She delivered the afterbirth and then submitted to the usual post-birth care routines. Beverly, even as she followed the staff's instructions, kept her gaze fixed upon the doctors and nurses as they worked on her daughter. She watched their every move. She looked no where else.. But her mind was too numb to really grasp everything that was occurring.

_For their daughter had yet to cry…_

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

"Who invited you?" Fleet Admiral Winston Holt Wiley gruffly asked. It wasn't that he officially disapproved of this brash captain. For this man certainly had his good points when it came to being a Starfleet captain and doctor. But personally, it was the way that the fleet admiral's wife - not to mention just about every other red-blooded (and a few green-blooded) women reacted to the captain - that caused Admiral Wiley to find personal fault with this man_. Somewhat intensely_. Not that you could tell this from the admiral's outward appearance. His '_Fleet Admiral knows best' _smile was now properly affixed to his visage.

Captain James Howard flashed his best, most deferential smile at his supreme commanding officer, trying not to reveal his surprise at finding the fleet admiral wearing an ordinary, Starfleet admiral's uniform sans gold braiding. He considered the possibility that Jean-Luc Picard's sense of style might unwittingly be influencing the fleet admiral's sartorial choices.

"I'm family. After all, I am Beverly's cousin, Sir." Captain Howard was seemingly unaware that his special smile was not working on the fleet admiral.

"That still doesn't mean that you should be here," Holt countered.

"Jamie!" A very happy Wesley Crusher stepped over and acknowledged his cousin. To onlookers, it would appear that Cadet Crusher hadn't noticed Holt's reaction to the doctor for the cadet's greeting was genuinely welcoming and full of excitement. "My Mom just had the twins!" He hugged this relative stranger for as of this moment, next to the Picards, Jamie O'Malley Howard was the closest thing to a member of the family that Wesley had. Wesley was just glad that he was here. After expressing his delight over having gained a new brother and sister, he offered Jamie a wine glass.

Jamie gratefully accepted it and then waited to see if anyone else was drinking. Apparently no one was, as of yet. Everyone was waiting for Q to say something more.

"No…" Q said the word softly, but everyone in the room heard it. _"Nooooo…" _This time he cursed it.

Marie gasped and clutched Robert's arm.

Q clicked his fingers. And then he disappeared.

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

More seconds passed. And with each one, the dread filling the minds of Jean-Luc and Beverly grew exponentially.

Guinan, who had been standing behind the doctors, watching as they worked on the baby girl, suddenly stiffened, and reached up and removed her mask, unhooking it and then slipping it off of her ear lobes. Then she turned her head and smiled directly over at Jean-Luc and Beverly.

Beverly's relief was physical as she sobbed in her husband's arms. And as he sobbed in hers. For Guinan's smile was the most beautiful expression that Jean-Luc had ever beheld.

Now, the voices from Dr. Bolt and Dr. Pulaski became louder. Beverly focused on one of them. "Why isn't she crying?" Dr. Bolt asked.

"Maybe she has nothing to cry about," Guinan softly suggested as she moved away from the baby toward the birthing bed where Beverly was waiting to see her new-born daughter.

There was a flash of light. And then Q made his presence known.

"You're too late," Guinan ironically stated.

A flash of fear crossed over Q's face. And then he sensed the pleased emotions of the room. And he seethed over Guinan's insensitive choice of words. Of course, some people would find it ironic that a member of the Q Continuum would be upset over someone else's _insensitivity._

For a change, this member of the Continuum decided not to be the _insensitive_ one. Calling out, as if seeking to be heard by someone distant, he yelled, "Everything's swell! Drink!" Then he smiled, pleased that he was a harbinger of joy to the people in the waiting room for a change, instead of being his usual _something else._

With erratic gasps for breath, Beverly watched Kate Pulaski bring her daughter over to her. It wasn't until Beverly's trembling arms held her daughter that her doctor's sense of panic faded away. The first thing she did was kiss her baby's forehead, check every toe and fingernail, wipe away more than a few tears from her own cheeks, and then nuzzle the girl's downy red gold hair. Still, in spite of this commotion, the baby did not cry.

"She weighs less than her brother," Dr. Pulaski informed Dr. Crusher-Picard, using her best _there-there-now _doctor's voice. "Your son weighs in at three-thousand three-hundred-and-ten grams. Your little girl here came in at one thousand, nine-hundred-and-forty-five grams. Or as we used to say it in my neck of the woods, approximately three-and-a-half pounds versus her brother's six-and-a half pounds." Kate smiled again at Jean-Luc Picard as if to reassure him about these medical facts. "Certainly, your daughter is on the small side for her gestational age, but it is close enough to the norms to be okay. And all of her other vitals are good." She glanced over at William. "And as you can tell by William's lusty yells, he is very normal as well."

"Why isn't she crying?" Jean-Luc's voice cracked as the words came out far less steady than usual.

"If you pinch her, my goddaughter probably will cry," Lwaxana recommended as she came over to stand by Beverly.

Jean-Luc Picard found the strength to glare at the senior ambassadress from Betazed.

Lwaxana continued even as she ignored Jean-Luc. She leaned forward to kiss the top of the baby's downy head. "She isn't crying because she still doesn't have anything to cry about, do you, my _Little One?" _She straightened up.

"_Coochie coo?" _Q cooed as he too, leaned over to touch the baby's head with his lips, even as he then softly whispered into the baby's ear, "I give you your birth day gift, my dear - the gift of a _normal_ childhood… or as normal as it can be for having me for your very own fairy godfather."

The very sleepy baby opened her startling topaz blue eyes, stared for a moment at her mother, and then waved a tiny hand in Q's direction. _And then she gurgled._

And Jean-Luc Picard experienced one of the more humbling occasions of his life - and fatherhood. His daughter's first _noise_ was made for Q - and not to him. It was a moment and a feeling that Jean-Luc would never forget. _And why…_

_At least Q had yet to crow…_

Guinan placed her arm around Jean-Luc's shoulders and hugged him. "Enjoy the silence, Jean-Luc. I have a feeling that once your daughter starts talking, you won't know what peace and quiet is for quite a few decades to come."

"I pray for that day, Guinan…"

Beverly motioned for Jean-Luc to come closer. "Your turn, _Daddy_," she whispered as she handed her daughter over to her father to be held in his arms for the very first time.

"_Mon ami,_ you're crying," Q observed as he watched a few tears trickle down Jean-Luc's cheeks. "Well, I suppose if I were lucky enough to be her father, I'd be crying too. You're forgiven - this time."

Jean-Luc hadn't a clue as to why Q was forgiving him. And he didn't care one little bit. For now he was holding his most precious and beloved daughter. And his new-born daughter was so impressed by being held in her father's loving arms for the first time that she closed her eyes and promptly fell asleep.

The look of panic on her husband's face as he tried to figure out how to move and not awaken his daughter at the same time was a sight that Beverly would forever remember with great fondness - and amusement. Eventually Guinan took pity on the man and guided him into a chair as he still clutched his daughter.

Dr. Bolt brought the now-quiet baby brother back over to his mother.

Kate Pulaski made sure that there would be pictures.

And Jean-Luc now truly comprehended what pure and utter joy was. And what it forever would be to him - _his family._

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

Q popped back into the waiting room, bestowing a reassuring smile on the waiting crowd. And then reached up and grabbed his still floating in the air champagne flute. For he'd left it hanging when he'd gone to see what was wrong in the delivery suite. And no one else had dared to touch it while he was gone.

"Everything is fine," Q informed the waiting crowd, with a special sympathetic look sent in Marie's direction. "My goddaughter just had to make her arrival a bit more dramatic than her brother's birth." He lowered his voice as he added, "You know how women are… Always having to make a memorable entrance."

Q did not know Marie Picard very well. Therefore he had no reason to suspect that his words would be relayed to Mildred Krebs as soon as Madame Picard saw her. And how the ladies would conspire to torment him in the future because of his poorly chosen commentary.

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

"I think I've figured it out," Kate Pulaski declared to everyone in general in the birthing room.

"Figured what out?" Lwaxana just had to ask.

"What happened." She looked down at Beverly. "Are you up to hearing what I suspect has occurred?"

Beverly was almost too-exhausted to tell Kate her answer.

It was Jean-Luc who replied for his bride. "Is the information medically urgent?"

"No…"

"Then it can wait for a few hours," he ordered.

Kate Pulaski merely looked amused as she watched an admiral trying to throw his weight around in her domain.

Norah came over to the bed taking in the life-affirming tableaux. "Beverly, are you up to trying to breastfeed, now?"

Not for the first time, Beverly just wished that she could rest. But, as always, her babies would come first. She stirred moving aside the flap of her hospital gown. "One at a time, I think," she quietly stated as she reached for her daughter. Expertly lining up the infant for lactation, she thrilled at the first touch of her daughter's lips to her nipple as she fed this baby her colustrum. Her daughter began rooting successfully. Every little burp she made pleased her mother.

Jean-Luc could only gaze upon this scene in awe, even as he now held his son who was surprisingly patiently waiting.

"Clever child," Lwaxana thought to observe.

"Jean-Luc, what's her name?" Guinan too-casually asked, as she beamed with pride down upon the littlest Picards.

Surprised by this question, Jean-Luc looked over at Beverly. He spoke out, though he was afraid of Beverly's response. "_Mon coeur, _what is your decision when it comes to our daughter's name?"

"She really still wants Lwaxana…" Beverly ruefully confessed.

"Of course she does," Lwaxana cooed in the background. "Lwaxana is such a wonderful name for a girl."

Jean-Luc just knew what was coming. And he could not forestall it. "Beverly," he growled.

"Lwaxana Adele Marie Picard," Beverly announced as she handed her now suddenly sleeping daughter over to Guinan. "We'll call her _Anna_," Beverly stated even as she switched babies with her husband.

"Make it so," he found himself agreeing. Not that he had much of a choice in the matter. For his daughter began as she meant to go on. If she wanted _Lwaxana_ - then she got _Lwaxana_. Anna was destined to wrap Admiral Jean-Luc Picard around her pretty little finger for the rest of her father's life. Though Jean-Luc decided that he would only call his daughter by her formal name at important moments. _Or when she was in need of discipline…_

Her daughter had taken almost an ounce, her mother thought as the baby suckled. And for now, it was enough. Just to be sure, she checked with the lactation expert who had entered the birthing room and was silently monitoring the twins and the mother.

The very friendly and affirming lactation expert checked her tricorder again, and stated, "Your galactopoietic hormones are within normal range, Mrs. Picard. Though you might need some hormone balancing within a day or two. You know that you have just had twins, but your body may not quite realize it and produce the colustrum in sufficient amounts."

"We'll be monitoring Beverly closely," Dr. Bolt agreed.

Ryllis walked over to the expert. "Both babies seem to have cottoned on to suckling properly."

"Some babies are like that, thank goodness. But of course, I'll keep monitoring them just in case their little tummies can't quite cope with it during the next forty-eight hours. That sometimes happens."

Ryllis nodded. The she faced Dr. Bolt. "How long will you wish to keep Dr. Picard and the twins here at Medical?"

"The next twenty-four hours, definitely," Norah announced as she still kept automatically checking padds and readings. "After that, we'll see. I'll be monitoring Anna closely."

"I'm still staying with Jean-Luc," Kate Pulaski added. "I'll be taking a few days off when we can bring them home, so I'll be able to monitor their progress without a problem."

For the first time in his life, Jean-Luc Picard was grateful for Kate Pulaski's presence in his life. "Thank you," was all that he said to his part-time nemesis. And it was all that needed to be said.

"Well, I'd better go and tell everyone the all important details." She squeezed Jean-Luc's shoulder. "And then I'll make sure that everyone else who should be informed is informed."

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

After Q toasted his godchildren for a second time finishing off his flute, he announced to everyone in the waiting room, "Ooops, I knew there was something that I was forgetting to do. Gotta go!" With that cryptic statement, he disappeared.

A moment later, the sound of a trumpet voluntary by Jeremiah Clarke filled the air, ringing about the room. Unfortunately, the air it was filling was not a concert hall or a Gothic cathedral. Instead, the trumpet heralded the arrival of Q on the bridge of the _Enterprise._

Will Riker unwittingly copied one of Jean-Luc Picard's mannerisms. Captain Riker closed his eyes, mentally groaned, opened his eyes, and then refrained (almost) from bellowing, "Q!"

"Greeting, oh impotent hairy one. I come bearing great news!"

Riker assumed that Q's insult was meant for the captain of the _Enterprise_ and no one else on the bridge

Deanna rushed over to Q and hugged this member of the Continuum for all that she was worth. Considering the way the lady felt when she pressed herself against him, even Q decided that Lwaxana might be in the right of it - _what was taking Riker so long to marry this woman…_

But Q had more important things to do at the moment than just to admire Deanna Troi.

"I announce the arrival of bouncing baby boy _William _Alexander Robert Picard and his twin sister, the very special little lady Lwaxana Adele Marie Picard."

Captain William Riker wasn't often caught speechless but the realization that Jean-Luc and Beverly had named their son after him, shook him to his very soul.

Deanna was torn between laughter and tears. _Jean-Luc had named his daughter after her mother? _Deanna groaned out loud too. _Having Beverly's daughter named after her - her mother was going to be insufferable after this…_

As if Q knew Deanna's thoughts, he added, "For some inescapable reason, baby girl Picard _wanted_ to be called 'Lwaxana'. Though why Jean-Luc gave in to his daughter's wishes is beyond me."

Captain William Thomas Riker was now thoroughly confused. _For exactly how could anyone know what a new-born baby wanted to be named? _Will had sensed that there was something unusual about Beverly's pregnancy, but at this moment, he hadn't a clue as to what it was.

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

Beverly was sleeping the sleep of the truly exhausted.

Jean-Luc rested on his bed in their maternity suite, just gazing upon her in the low lighting of the room. Their twins were sleeping in their monitored cribs close to Beverly on the other side of her bed. Even though he was dead tired himself, he found that he could not sleep. The tumultuous day that he had just spent kept roiling about in his mind. Everything from an earthquake to being stuck in an elevator to fearing for the life of his daughter crashed inward on his soul.

He recollected what it had been like with Eline when she had first given birth. He had had an easy time of it then when Meribor was born, in comparison to what Beverly had just gone through. But now, more than ever, he was grateful for his other lifetime with Eline, if only because the expression on Kate Pulaski's face when she realized that Jean-Luc Picard actually knew how to properly hold a new born infant, much less change a diaper, had been a very gratifying experience for him.

He rested against his pillow, still just drinking in the sight of his family. And thanking the beneficent gods for their gifts to him even as his son began to cry.

The door to their pale peach and sage decorated room slid open.

"_Warp speed _there, needs to be changed," the night nurse whispered to Admiral Picard.

"_Warp speed?"_ the father queried.

"Admiral Wiley was telling everyone who'd listen how his godson had been born at warp speed. And considering how fast that birth was, he almost is telling the truth," the nurse cheerfully explained.

And Jean-Luc recollected hearing those words being said at some time during the birthing process. He mentally groaned at the thought that William already had a nickname, and his son wasn't even eight hours old…

"He's hungry too," the pediatrics nurse added as she fitted the boy with a new diaper.

"What about Anna? Is she hungry as well?"

"Probably. Twins tend to do things together, if you're really lucky."

Jean-Luc went over to his daughter and checked her diaper. She was still dry. And the nurse was duly impressed that this first-time father even knew to do that. Then Jean-Luc picked up his daughter and quietly walked over to Beverly.

"_Mon coeur, _I am sorry to wake you…" He lightly touched Beverly's shoulder.

She opened one eye. "You feed them," she suggested even as she stirred.

"I would if I could, _mon coeur."_

"Give me a couple of days. I'll be expressing milk by then." Beverly raised up the back of her hospital bed. Then she held out her arms for her daughter. The nurse brought William over to the other side.

"Dr. Picard, would you like to try two at a time? It might get you back to sleep faster, if you do."

"Why not," the still exhausted Beverly agreed.

As Jean-Luc watched Beverly settle their two children against her breasts, he asked of the pediatrics nurse, "They must be fed every two to three hours?"

"If you're lucky, sometimes new-borns might last four hours before they get hungry again," she advised.

"No, nurse," Beverly disagreed. "Wake me every three hours if the twins don't start crying before then because they are hungry. They really should be on a two-hour feeding schedule. I'll try to maintain that during waking hours."

"Of course, Dr. Picard," the nurse acknowledged. "I'll make the notation on your padd. Do you seem to be producing enough milk?"

"So far," Beverly answered, as she shifted about a bit trying to find a more comfortable position. However, she had her arms full. Jean-Luc immediately went over to Beverly, eased William away from his feeding by guiding the nipple out of his son's mouth with a finger, and then positioned William on a pillow before he returned his son to nursing at his mother's breast.

The nurse was even more impressed by the husband as she observed that maneuver. She made mention of the father's unexpected competency on her padd. He had clearly been around a new born before. After watching a minute or two more, she nodded over at the nursing admiral. "I'll be back in about fifteen minutes." And then she left.

Jean-Luc went over to Anna's side of the bed, and sat on the edge for the bed was wide enough for him to do so without disturbing Beverly's position.

"Oh, _mon coeur…"_

Beverly sighed. "I never thought that we'd get rid of all of our visitors. This seems like the first time that we are actually alone with our children."

Jean-Luc slowly moved a finger down Beverly's right breast ending this motion with a light tap on his daughter's forehead."

"She still hasn't cried, has she?"

"No, not yet. But Kate and Norah both say that there isn't any reason why she can't cry - except that maybe, as Guinan suggested, that she has nothing to cry about yet." Beverly shifted a little. "Her appetite isn't as voracious as William, but she is sucking pretty steadily now."

Jean-Luc picked up an iced carafe and asked, "Would you like some apple juice?"

"Yes. But add some cranberry juice to it too…" Beverly leaned back against the pillows and rested her eyes.

Her loving husband, mixed the juice in a tall glass and then brought it over to her, and lifted the straw to her lips. He was pleased to see that Beverly drank it all.

"Do you want some more?"

"Not now," she sighed as she tried coping with two suddenly squirming babies.

"William's done," she announced as she nodded her head in her son's direction. As Jean-Luc picked up the baby and put the boy back in his crib, he heard Beverly weakly say, "We have to remember which breast which child used after each feeding. We have to alternate them…" Beverly instructed, even as she kept nodding off.

Satisfied that William was already sleeping, Jean-Luc returned to Beverly's side and watched as Anna slowly drank. His daughter didn't seem to have the energy of her brother, but so far, she was doing all right. When she would suckle no more, Jean-Luc removed her from the arms of his now sleeping wife, burped her, and then returned the baby to her crib. He was changing Anna's diaper when the nurse returned.

"You most definitely have been around new-borns before," the nurse remarked.

"Yes. It was a long time ago. But apparently there are just some skills that one does not forget."

The nurse watched him finish and then ordered, "Now you go and get some sleep too. Their next feeding will come very fast…"

Knowing this to be the truth, Jean-Luc settled himself down for a nap even as he watched the nurse silently check all the monitors and then spray some sort of lanolin protectant on Beverly's breasts before she drew the blanket up higher over the dead-to-the-world new mother.

"Good night," she whispered as she left the room.

And Jean-Luc found himself about to sleep with his wife and their children. And his heart rejoiced even as he fell asleep.

_**A.N.:**__ Well the end is almost here. Just one more chapter to go for this particular story. I hopefully will have it up before the end of the month. And there is a lot more to come in the De-Tached Series. I think that Wesley will be next…_


	8. Chapter 8: Brandy and Bull

_**A.N.: **__It seems that I have more than one chapter left to this story, so this is not the last chapter…_

_**De-Tached: Story 5: Life with Beverly**_

_**Chapter 8: Brandy and Bull….**_

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

Jean-Luc paused before he entered the dining room, silently studying his stepson for he was still eating his dinner. He was mildly impressed by the amount of food that Wesley was consuming. Jean-Luc remembered a time in his far distant past when he too, ate like a teenage boy. Though he could not fault the boy for choosing to eat with his family for Ludvig was a far better chef than most with that title who worked in the Academy cafeterias. Still, the quantity that the boy was ingesting was impressive.

Wesley noticed his stepfather looking at him. "Sir?"

"I take it that you are still hungry, Wes."

"Yes, Jean-Luc. I was at the UP all night through this afternoon." He looked down at the ratatouille that he'd been eating. "I guess that I forgot to eat when I was working with Dr. Brahms."

Jean-Luc nodded in understanding. He could recall Beverly coming in to his ready room on board the _Enterprise _on many occasions_, _ordering him to eat as well because he had forgotten to consume sustenance during some crisis.

"Well then, Wesley, please join me in the library when you are finished eating - at your convenience." With that, Jean-Luc quickly turned and left the lad alone.

Wesley shook his head, somewhat puzzled by his stepfather's words and seemingly abrupt departure. Since the admiral had called him by his first name, he knew that whatever the man wished to talk to him about would be personal and would not concern official Starfleet business. Still, there had been a sense of unease about the man that was unfamiliar to Wesley. If it had been anyone else, Wesley would have thought that his stepfather seemed nervous. Still, Wesley couldn't even begin to guess what the topic of their conversation would be. Because of the momentous recent events, life at the Picard household had been somewhat chaotic during the past weeks since his brother and sister had come into the world. A sense of normalcy, not to mention balance, had yet to be achieved.

A sudden thought struck the cadet. Maybe the admiral wanted him to move back to the dorm on a full-time basis, rather than be underfoot now that the babies were here…

Jean-Luc entered his library and went straight toward a secret hidey hole in the wall opposite from the fireplace. Jean-Luc had discovered a second secret compartment in his library during his paternity leave. And this one was full of rare, vintage brandy bottles that looked like they had not been touched in decades - if not centuries. He tapped the secreted latch under a swag on the ornately carved wood panel and waited for the hidden door to swing open. He reached for an open bottle and poured out two drinks into Baccarat balloon snifters. Then he brought both goblets over to a table by the Chesterfield sofa in front of the fireplace. Because it had been a warm day, instead of igniting a fire, Jean-Luc turned on a holographic fire projecting into the fireplace. He found firelight - even faux firelight - to be somewhat relaxing. Then he settled himself on the sofa and picked up a padd that he'd been working on earlier in the evening. He had begun easing himself back into his superintendent's business duties even though Jean-Luc Picard was not going to be officially on duty for another eight days.

A few minutes later, Wesley tapped on the door and then entered the room.

Jean-Luc motioned toward the open space on the sofa.

The cadet's eyes widened when he saw the two brandy snifters. "Jean-Luc, uh, are you expecting someone this evening?"

Jean-Luc inwardly smiled, even as he stood and picked up the snifter that had the lesser amount of brandy in it. "No, Wesley. This one is for you. I prefer to observe French sensibilities in my house." He handed the snifter to his stepson. Somewhat shocked, though admirably hiding it (or so he thought) from his stepfather, Wesley accepted the Baccarat cut crystal brandy glass.

"Hold the stem and the base of the goblet between your fingers and slowly swirl the brandy over the palm of your hand. Like this." Jean-Luc demonstrated. "You want to use the heat from the palm of your hand to warm the liquor. That permits the bouquet of the brandy wine to be released. Then you sniff." Jean-Luc sniffed. "And if you can smell the heady scent of the grapes, the brandy is ready to sip."

Wesley copied Jean-Luc's actions. After a few minutes, and double-checking with his stepfather, Wesley took a small sip of the brandy.

His stepfather nodded in approval as he observed his stepson savor the sip instead of gulping the liquor down. "You've been learning, Wesley." Jean-Luc openly smiled and sat back down on the sofa. "Sit, please, Wes."

"Yes, Jean-Luc." Even as he took another taste of the wine, he sat down, somewhat confused by his stepfather's actions. _For what was the occasion?_

They sat in companiable silence for a few minutes before Jean-Luc spoke up. "This is the Picard _Fi__ne de la Marne_ brandy. Some of the rarest and most valued brandy in the galaxy. I usually drink it only on occasions of importance."

"And you gave it to me to drink?" was Wesley's instantaneous response.

"How else are you going to develop a palate, young man?" Jean-Luc teased. You're now the nephew of a great vintner. I can assure you that in the future, someone will learn of your connection and question your experience with such things. So, it is my responsibility to teach you as best I can. Did you sample any of the Picard wines when you babysat Rene when his parents were in Paris with Beverly and myself?"

Wesley slowly drank another sip of wine before answering. "Only what was in the kitchen, sir. I drank a glass or two of the burgundy."

"The _vin de pays?"_

"Yes, sir. And when Rene and I went down to the winery, some of the workers gave us both samples of whatever they were preparing."

"Did you get drunk?"

"Oh, no, sir. I was watching Rene!"

Just by the way that he quickly answered that question, told Jean-Luc all that he really needed to know about Wesley's character when it came to drinking. Still, he questioned the boy. "But you have been intoxicated in the past?"

Wesley reddened some more. "When I was part of the Nova Squadron… We drank some beer…" He shook his head. "I did not care for the hangover part of getting drunk, so it only happened to me once."

Picard nodded, accepting the boy's words as the truth. "I cannot say that I have never drunk to excess, but once I became a captain, such an event was a very rare occasion indeed. Though what I might have been like as a rowdy ensign before I lost my heart, is of course, another matter entirely." He ruefully smiled at Wesley. "And if any of my old, old brothers-in-arms should ever happen to tell you about such interstellar incidents, do not believe them. That's an order."

Wesley laughed. "Of course, Jean-Luc," he replied, even as Wesley tried to envision a rowdy stepfather causing interstellar incidents. He was having trouble doing so.

Jean-Luc abruptly changed the direction of the conversation. "Wesley, how are you doing?" His voice was full of concern.

"Fine, Sir," he quickly replied.

Jean-Luc slightly shook his head. "You mistook my meaning, Wes. I am just inquiring as to how your are dealing with all the recent events of our lives together as a family. After all, no one consulted you to find out if you wished to have a new brother and sister thrust upon you…"

Wesley quickly interrupted him. "Oh no, Jean-Luc. I'm thrilled at having a brother and sister now. I've always wanted more siblings - more family. And the fact that they are your kids as well as my mom's, well, I just couldn't be happier about it." He reddened some more, feeling embarrassed at having to admit, "In fact, when I was younger, it was sort of a favorite daydream of mine. Uh, you and my mom being together that is. And having a family."

Jean-Luc smiled in sympathy. "It was one of my preferred dreams too, over the past few decades." They were silent again for a few more minutes before Jean-Luc spoke again. "Wesley, your mother and I…"

"Yes, Jean-Luc?"

"We _both_ want you to be a godfather when the twins are christened in LaBarre. We are hoping that you'll choose…"

"Anna?" Wesley interjected. "I sort of figured that Captain Riker would sponsor his namesake."

"Correct, young man. Will you be Anna's godfather?"

"Yes, I would be honored. But, what about Admiral Wiley? Didn't he want to be a godfather? Not to mention Q, Data, Worf, Geordi, Jamie…"

This time Jean-Luc interrupted Wesley. "Jamie? You do mean Captain Howard?"

"Yes, I ran into him when he was visiting Mom. He was trying to persuade her to name him as a godfather."

Jean-Luc refused to let his jealousy get the better of him over the effrontery of this upstart captain. He would deal with the man at a later date. And that date would be _very soon. _"That event is never going to occur. James Howard is not acceptable to me as a godfather," Jean-Luc informed his stepson.

"I kind of figured that." Wesley grinned. "I mean, I like Jamie because he's my cousin. But when it comes to serious matters and especially when it is concerning my mother…" He softly added almost to himself, "…_Jamie made Mom cry a long time ago_…" Wesley took a deep breath, before continuing. "He's not the most reliable sort…"

Jean-Luc nodded in understanding. And in confirmation of his own private opinion of the man. Then he turned his mind to more important matters than an importuning captain. "Wesley, when your mother wakes up, you can tell her that you are officially a godfather. Unfortunately, accepting this position necessitates…" Jean-Luc's voice dropped an octave. "…dealing with _Lwaxana_ as Anna's godmother."

Wesley's smile broadened. "Oh, I won that bet!"

Jean-Luc chose not to chastise his stepson since he'd been known to make similar bets himself, in the past. He spoke in a more normal tone of voice as he informed Wesley, "Deanna and Will are the godparents for Alexander."

"Warp speed Picard…" Wesley unwisely added.

"_Warp speed?_" Jean-Luc queried.

Wesley cheerfully supplied an explanation. "When I've been interning in Admiral Wiley's offices, every time he mentions the twins to any officer he can corner into listening, he always refers to my brother as _Warp Speed_."

Jean-Luc raised an eyebrow. He knew better than to protest Holt's choice of nicknames for his son. He'd deal with this matter in his own way. However, he supposed that he'd been told that Wesley was working in the Fleet Admiral's offices at some point in time, but somehow - and quite understandably all things considered - it had slipped his mind. "How long have you been working for Admiral Wiley?"

"Ever since I played poker with him on board the _Enterprise _after your wedding. When I returned to the Academy I found myself working half-days twice a week when I'm not working on a project at Utopia Planetia."

Jean-Luc knew that Wesley was at the very top of his class so he didn't question the cadet about his ability to do his own work as well as work for Winston Holt Wiley. But _why_ Winston Holt Wiley wanted Wesley to work for him was another matter indeed. Internships in the admiral's office were considered to be a highly prized position by those cadets and ensigns working toward a diplomatic or political position as their future goal. A cadet with Wesley's scientific studies was an odd choice for such a position. "Did Holt ever tell you why he chose you?"

"Well, officially, I am supposed to absorb the fact that there is more to Starfleet than just flying around in pretty starships and making new scientific discoveries on uncharted worlds. Or at least, that is what Admiral Wiley says. In reality, though, I think Admiral Wiley just wants me around as a substitute in case he's short a hand for a poker game. I've already played in some games during the past few months."

Jean-Luc drew a sharp breath at this news. "Wesley, I can think of several admirals who would kill to be in such a position as yours. There are admirals who have never played a single hand of poker with the fleet admiral. And who in all likelihood, never will have the chance…"

It wasn't a lad who responded. By the look in Wesley's eyes, Jean-Luc quickly understood that his stepson comprehended more than the superficial.

"Jean-Luc, I am not sure of all of Admiral Wiley's motives. He is not an obvious man. I am learning to appreciate that fact, especially when I deal with some of his complex situations." Wesley shook his head. "I thought that having to be a diplomat as a starship captain was a difficult enough of a responsibility. But the diplomatic levels that Admiral Wiley deals with are mind-boggling."

"And he chose _you, _Wesley." Picard contemplated this fact. "I can only suspect that he wishes for you to learn more than what the normal Starfleet cadet experiences before they graduate." Silently, Jean-Luc vowed to learn exactly what Holt was trying to do with his stepson. _And what Winston Holt Wiley was plotting to do with Wesley in the future…_

"That I am indeed learning, Jean-Luc." Wesley took another small sip of brandy. "How many years were you in the diplomatic corps as a Starfleet officer?"

"Officially two years. But once I became a senior line officer, I felt as if I always had to practice diplomacy, Wesley. Every away team mission that I was on meant that it might be a diplomatic mission. And when I became a captain, it was as if every mission required diplomacy of some sort - most certainly when it came to mediating disputes or first contacts." Jean-Luc drank some more brandy too. "And it was that way until I was promoted to the admiralty. Though now, I practice diplomacy of a completely different sort." Picard chuckled. "Now, Romulans brandishing disruptors seem far less dangerous to me than certain contentious Academy board members. Not to mention the occasional career diplomat with which I must deal."

Wesley smiled. For he too, had encountered a few imperious admirals or senators during his work in Wiley's office.

Jean-Luc stood and picked up his snifter, motioning for Wesley to do the same. He raised his glass in a toast. "To your mother. To Beverly."

Grinning, Wesley added, "To Mom! The best mother any kid - or twins - could have…"

Drinking together both men finished off their snifters and then put them down on the table.

"I suppose I should go and study. Final exams aren't that far away."

"Wes, check in on your mother and see if she is awake. If she is, let me know, and then tell Ludvig to send up her supper. And mine as well. I find that this two-hour feeding schedule is exhausting for me. I can only imagine how your mother is feeling."

Wesley nodded, even as he idly wondered if his mom had mentioned to her husband how her breast milk was being supplemented with replicated milk. She didn't have to feed every two hours now... Oh well, he knew that his mother would get around to telling her husband if she had not already done so. Still, he grinned at the thought of how his mother was managing both the twins as well as her husband…


	9. Chapter 9: Nursery Times

_**A.N.:**__ I wish to apologize for the long delay in posting these new chapters. Unfortunately life threw quite a few unexpected things at me all at once on top of it being the busiest time of year for me as well. This situation will probably continue on throughout the rest of the summer, so I will post when I can. And I'll answer emails and reply to reviews every couple of weeks as well. Things should be back to normal by Labor Day. I will continue writing with what little time I have; a word or two whenever I can - even if it is only on legal pad or an outdated I-Phone... _

_Well, this part of the "Life with…" series is almost over. So, let me know what you think._

_**De-Tached: Story 5: Life with Beverly**_

_**Chapter 9: Nursery Times…**_

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

Beverly hummed. And then she softly sang. She knew that she was not that great of a singer. But still as a mother, the sound of her voice carrying some sort of tune - in this case an ancient song called "_Too-ra-loo-ra-loo-ral" - _was well received by her audience of two. Her twins found her lullaby to be wonderful. So she sweetly sang as she gently rocked back and forth holding her babes. They were sleepy, now. She felt a almost indescribable, joyful peace suffuse her being as she slowly rocked and sang.

A while later, even though the nanny moved silently, Beverly immediately knew when Ryllis had entered the nursery. Motioning toward the arm that held Alex, Ryllis carefully lifted the sleeping boy and placed him in his cradle.

With her arm free, Beverly moved part of her blouse aside, and encouraged her daughter to root again on her breast. The sleepy baby seemed to think about it for a moment before her lips settled onto her mother's breast and began to nurse.

"How is she doing?" a concerned voice softly asked from the doorway. Beverly watched as Kate Pulaski strolled into the nursery. "I read that she grew by thirty grams since yesterday," the doctor remarked as she stood looking down at her nursing patient.

"Anna has indeed gained some more weight," Beverly happily agreed. "She's now gained back all the weight that she lost after she was born, and then some." She cast a glance toward her son. "Though Alex gained back his lost birth weight in only a few days…"

Kate lazily stroked her finger across the baby's golden red downy hair. "This little one has got a long way to go to catch up with her brother." For no one doubted how healthy her brother was when he opened his mouth to let forth a lusty squall. But Anna still seemed fragile… "But she is doing it. She's getting stronger."

Beverly adjusted her position a bit even as Kate studied the girl.

"Anna is a most remarkable little girl, Beverly. I can't get over how her big brother was trying to protect her almost from the very beginning of the second trimester…"

"Even as Anna was trying to protect _me," _Beverly readily agreed. "I still can't quite comprehend how my little one here did her best to ease my birthing pains, even to the point where she masked some of my symptoms."

"And of course we didn't suspect it since who could believe that a baby in utero could do such a thing. It's the first time I've ever heard of it. Anna's a true empath with some unusual gifts," Kate readily agreed. "And then some." Kate sat down on the second rocker in the room by the other side of Alex's cradle. "I have been double-checking her medical reports. So far, nothing unusual has been officially reported. Between Norah and myself, we'll do our best to keep it that way." Kate rocked a bit more, before she paused, thought about it and then spoke. "Q interfered, you know."

Beverly nodded. "Q came to me and explained what he'd done. And why he had done it. He didn't want Anna to grow up trying to cope with her remarkable gifts and also have to cope with being a child at the same time." Beverly sighed as she tickled her daughter's tummy for a moment, still encouraging her to nurse some more. "He said that he gave Anna the gift of _normalcy_ until she was sixteen. Then he'd come back and help."

"I suppose I believe him. He does seem to be emotionally invested in the twins," Kate agreed. "Q can actually be a good _whatever_ _he calls himself,_ which is something that I never thought that I would ever say about him."

Beverly laughed. "I know. Even Jean-Luc doesn't quite know what to make of this _reformed_ Q. The idea of Q as a supportive family friend still boggles my husband's mind."

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

"_Seventy-six trombones led the big parade…"_

Beverly could only smile at the sight of the Fleet Commander of Starfleet bouncing her baby boy on his knee. She had surprised Admiral Winston Holt Wiley when she'd walked into the nursery. He was sitting there, simultaneously rocking Anna's cradle even as he played with her twin son.

"Holt."

He looked up at Beverly, automatically admiring how she looked in her turquoise blue sweater and matching leggings. A single matching blue ribbon held her riotous curls at bay. He wished that all of his admirals were so pleasing on the eyes.

"Beverly." He bounced the boy some more. "This little one was bright eyed and bushy tailed when I came to visit. He seemed to be in the mood for some play time with his godfather."

Beverly inwardly winced. Apparently Holt was assuming too much. (Not that this was a great surprise.)

"About being a godfather, Holt…"

Holt stopped making trombone noises at Alex and lifted his head. "Beverly, I've already arranged for Will Riker to bring the _Enterprise_ back to Earth in time for their christening. I wouldn't wish for Will not to be there. But if fate intervenes, then I'll be the back-up for this boy here - just in case."

Beverly nodded as she sat down on her rocker for Winston was occupying Jean-Luc's rocker.

"Thank you for understanding, Holt. And for everything else…"

"Beverly, when you named the boy _William_ instead of _Winston,_ I deduced that it was a clue as to whom you would choose to be this boy's godfather." He chuckled as William decided that this kind man's finger was worthy to be sucked upon.

"Holt…"

He nodded. "Beverly…" He lifted the boy up and handed him to his mother. "I suspect that he is hungry."

"He is." Beverly didn't have to try to sense her son's wishes. She recognized the demanding look on her baby's face as he opened his mouth to wail.

Holt blushed as he assumed that Beverly was going to be breastfeeding her son. "Perhaps I'd better go…"

"Holt, you don't have to…" Beverly reached down and pulled out a contraption from a storage basket by the side of her rocker. "I don't mind if you stay." It took Holt a moment to recognize the item as a breast pump. He turned beet red. Inwardly, Beverly did her best, struggling to control her mischievous grin as she still rummaged about, until finally pulling forth a baby bottle from the stasis container that was also to the side of her chair.

Holt was taken back for a second. Then he sent her a knowing look for he had suddenly realized that she had successfully pulled his leg. There were few in Starfleet who could - or would - do such a thing to him. He liked her all the more for it. He handed Beverly her son.

"Lwaxana and I will be moving out after the christening," he broadly announced.

He didn't yell 'April Fool!' after making this statement. This gave Beverly reason to pause as she considered his words. "You know that you are welcome here, Holt. You don't have to leave."

"Oh yes I do. If I don't, I'll start taking over all of your lives - even if I don't really intend to do so." His chuckle sounded rather self-satisfied. "I've been informed that I am the bossy type by more than a few people. And I know what I am like to live with… My ex-wives were pretty succinct on that subject matter too…" He grinned, more to himself than for his audience. "There's a reason as to why my kids stay as far away from me as they can. And it ain't because they don't love me…"

"And yet you married Lwaxana?"

"The lady tries to take over my life, _Red_. I counter her moves. It's a most interesting challenge. Adds spice to the marriage, eh?"

'_Interesting' _was not the word that Beverly would have used to describe the relationship between Holt and Lwaxana…

Holt segued into another subject. "About that son of yours - the smart one - Wesley…"

Beverly was instantly alert. The way Holt had said her son's name awakened all of Beverly's maternal protective instincts.

"What about Wesley, Holt?" Her steady gaze betrayed not an iota of concern, as she calmly held the baby bottle to her son's lips.

"Just how much does Wes want to be posted to the _Enterprise _when he graduates?"

Beverly wasn't quite sure how to respond. Wesley's post-Academy intentions had been bouncing around all over the place recently. For a cadet who was under censorship, he had already received several impressive offers. "I know that Wesley is looking forward to being under Captain Riker's command, in spite of the difficulties that he knows that he will face because of the Nova Squadron incident."

"About the Nova Squadron…" Holt sighed. "I couldn't interfere with Admiral Brand back then. I couldn't undermine the Superintendent though I did disagree with her when the board expelled Locarno. Still with the way that you and Jean-Luc handled things, it was the best outcome one could hope for, under the circumstances."

"Wesley is well aware of how fortunate he is," Beverly lowly responded. "Do you mean to take his posting away from him?"

"No, I'm not going to take the _Enterprise_ posting away from him. I was, however, hoping that I could persuade him to delay the posting for a year or two.

"Delay?"

"Wesley's a bright boy. Genius, actually."

"I know." Beverly didn't have to boast about her son's brains. Those that knew him, knew of them.

"Well, to make the tale short, I'd like Wesley to stay with me as a junior personal adjutant after he graduates."

Beverly's eyes widened. This offer was unexpected. "Why?"

"The boy already knows how to be a scientific genius, not to mention having learned from the best there is as to how to be a Starfleet officer… Which reminds me, he still is, by the way."

Beverly blinked. "Wesley still is _what_?"

"An ensign. I never cancelled his commission when he became a cadet. I just temporarily 'froze' it, as it were. He'll get his back pay when he graduates." He caught the surprised look on Beverly's face. "And no, I didn't tell anyone - not even Brand or your husband. It was my back-up ploy just in case Wesley did get kicked out of the Academy for doing something foolish. If there is anything I know it is young men and the passions that drive them. Sooner or later, after he came to the Academy and tested his wings, Wesley was going to do something stupid. So I did it to protect him just in case what Wesley did was _really_ stupid. _And it was."_

Beverly wasn't going to let herself be distracted. Not when it came to Wesley's future. "Why, Holt?"

"I think Wesley is savvy enough to learn how to become a diplomat and then a politician. Eventually when he goes out on his deep space tours, he'll be far better prepared for dealing with the unknown than your usual greenhorn ensigns."

These were nice sentiments, Beverly decided, But she also knew that they were not the only truths as to why Holt wanted Wesley. "Again, why, Holt? What do you need Wesley for?"

Holt eyed his favorite doctor. He already knew that she was always far too observant. Which was, of course, one of the reasons as to why he really admired her. Though he didn't appreciate it when she used her perceptiveness against him. "Beverly, I think that one day, though not in the too-near future, Wesley could become one of the special few who can shape and guide the direction of the Federation. I think that he possesses the abilities to do so."

"Shape the direction of the Federation?" Beverly whispered. _"My son?"_

"I think that one day Wesley will play an important part in our future, Beverly. I am just making sure that he acquires all the knowledge, skill and experience along the way that Wesley will need, just in case I am right about your son's destiny." Winston amiably nodded, stood, tried to straighten out his back which was cramping from having been ensconced so long on the platform rocker, and then announced, "See you at dinner."

"I see…," Beverly whispered, troubled by what Holt had revealed to her.

Holt abruptly stopped walking, turned and looked at Beverly, silently liking the slight confusion that he could detect on the lady's face, and then he broadly smiled. "Of course, Beverly, my real reason for wanting Wesley with me could simply be that I like the boy and I want him around me for a while longer. He is _almost _a very good poker player. And it annoys the hell out of Alynna." With a nod at Beverly, a beaming smile directed toward his honorary godson, and a fond look at his sleeping sister, Holt then he left the nursery.

Beverly automatically burped her son, put him in his cradle, and checked to see if Anna was up to feeding as well. She did all this even as her mind whirled about as she considered everything that Holt had just revealed. She had given up trying to make Wesley's life 'normal' a long time ago. But she had still fought to bring some sort of normalcy into his life as he grew up. It was the chief reason that she'd wanted the posting to the_ Enterprise _years ago. She never wanted for him to be too different, too isolated. Yet Holt's very prognostication indicated otherwise. She had a lot to discuss with Jean-Luc.

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

"Men just love my bosoms," Lwaxana unabashedly announced, glancing down at her assets that were on their usual display - and still pretty firm even if she thought so herself. "Even my little men like them," she cooed as she tickled the baby boy trying to pat her breasts which were partially encased in a crimson brocade bodice. She sensed what the boy wanted. "No, my little one, I cannot feed you. That's your mother's job." She raised her head, eyeing the lady dressed in a rose jersey blouse and slacks, seated on the other rocker in the nursery, looking quite maddonaesque as she nourished her daughter. "Are you up to the task, Beverly?"

Beverly sighed, mentally debating if she should make a comment about Lwaxana's observations about her bosoms. Deciding that Lwaxana had probably heard (if not said) it all about her breasts, Beverly sighed again, and answered the woman. "Hold on to Will just a little longer, if you can, Lwaxana. Anna is still nursing." Beverly stroked her daughter's face with a gentle touch as the baby still suckled. "William Alexander is getting too big to feed along side with Anna. I don't want him disturbing Anna."

"No, we mustn't do anything to disturb Anna when she's hungry," Lwaxana agreed. "I'll feed Master William Alexander Robert." Still cuddling the boy, Lwaxana walked over to a glazed white French armoire, and opened a door, reaching in and pulling out a bottle that had been kept in stasis at the perfect temperature.

A few days earlier, Beverly had started filling bottles with a mixture of her expressed breast milk and replicated formula. The mixture was now being kept in stasis. There were quite a few baby bottle stasis units scattered around the nursery as well as the house, now. The twins were still on a two hour feeding schedule even without their mother being around. So far, both babies had been willing to drink from the bottles. Now, at least, Beverly had a chance to sleep four or six hours before she would have to be awakened.

That sat in silence for a while as both babies contentedly fed.

"Holding a baby - it's such a dear feeling," Lwaxana remarked as she slowly glided back and forth on her platform rocker. "How I miss it…"

Beverly observed Lwaxana's eyes tearing up but didn't remark about it. Instead, she waited a few moments before speaking. "Deanna is most determined in her pursuit of Will," she casually observed. "More so that I have ever seen her be."

"Wrong. All wrong," Lwaxana complained.

"How so?"

"William Riker should be pursuing Deanna. That's why she's never really caught him." She sighed loudly, again. "She's doing the chasing all wrong. If I hadn't personally given birth to Deanna, I really would have wondered how she could possibly be my natural daughter…" Lwaxana stifled a small, dramatic sob. "And to think I had such high hopes for the lad…"

Beverly refrained from rolling her eyes over Will Riker being referred to as a 'lad'. "Oh, I wouldn't give up on Deanna getting married in the near future," Beverly archly remarked, remembering how Deanna had behaved at her baby shower.

"Why?" The sound of Lwaxana's voice filled with tentative hope.

"I'd say that she's mounted a long-term strategic campaign against Will Riker. If I am right, Captain William Riker doesn't stand a chance in this battle between the sexes. I suspect that Deanna has finally made up her mind about what she really wants and now she's going after him. But don't tell her I said so," Beverly hastily added.

"Of course not, dear," Lwaxana said out loud. Silently, she promised herself, "But I will call Deanna just to see how the battle is progressing…"

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

Beverly heard Jean-Luc rummaging about in their dressing room that adjoined the nursery. She suspected that he must have gone riding after his day at the Academy which was why he was cleaning up instead of immediately coming in to see her and the twins after his second day back at the Superintendent's office.

A few minutes later, a slightly damp Jean-Luc Picard dressed in khaki slacks and an ivory shirt, entered the nursery, crossed over to Beverly, kissed her on the lips, and then reached for his son before sitting down on the gliding rocker that had become known as 'his'. "It's good to be home," he wearily remarked.

"Tough day?" Beverly sympathetically asked.

"Someone programmed the safeties 'off' for the Parissees Squares tournaments. It only took the referees two broken clavicles and one broken ankle before they noticed."

"Are the cadets all right?"

"Yes. They are all out of hospital this evening. I assigned Mr. Murphy the task of figuring out the elusive who-done-it. And why. I suspect, considering the sophistication of the override program to the sport center's holodecks, that it was the same cadet or cadets who reprogrammed our replicators during the Christmas party." He moved and then groaned, as if his muscles were protesting. _Something_. "Mr. Murphy did an excellent job when I was on leave. I can understand why Admiral Brand trusted him."

"Uh huh," Beverly grinned at her husband and then accurately guessed. "You went riding?"

"Yes. I needed to take my mind off of things." He ruefully smiled. "My thigh muscles are informing me that I overdid it. I haven't been riding that much especially since the last stage of your pregnancy. I apparently am out of shape."

"Why didn't you use the therapeutic settings when you took your shower?"

His smile turned into a charming grin. He confessed, "I was in a hurry to see you. A few twinges are not an acceptable reason for delaying my seeing you and the twins."

Beverly relished his sentiment even as the doctor in her assessed just how much pain Jean-Luc was experiencing - if he was willing to admit to a few 'twinges'. "After Anna goes back to sleep, I will fix you up right away."

Jean-Luc couldn't quite help his instinctive reaction to the thought of Beverly touching his thigh muscles with a regenerator. And judging by the coy little smile that she was now displaying toward him, she knew exactly what the subject matter of his thoughts were.

He paused for a moment, considering the strength of his psychic link with his wife. It was still there, but it was no longer the direct connection from her pregnancy with which he had become comfortable. It was almost as if it were now a link in some background noise rather than a solid tether. He breathily sighed. He didn't know how much he revealed of his emotions to his wife with that sound.

And Beverly knew exactly why he sighed. So she sighed too. "I do miss it as well, Jean-Luc."

"I wonder if there is any way our connection could be enhanced..."

Beverly warily eyed him. "Well, we have one known way of doing it. But, Jean-Luc, I am not getting pregnant again right away. Give me a few months at least, to catch my breath."

"So you think it was the surge in your hormones that enhanced our connection?"

"It's the most logical physical explanation, now that the connection is fading, darling."

"It's not fading - it's just going dormant_. Gone hibernatin'_, if I choose to use Will Riker's _patois_." Guinan stood in the doorway of the nursery, looking about as if judging the aquamarine and white cheerfully painted room with its floating starship mobiles above its cribs, and stylized hand-painted map of the Sol planetary system on the wall opposite the French doors, complete with Utopia Planetia highlighted as well as all the secondary space stations. Eventually she got around to glaring at the slightly sputtering Jean-Luc Picard who was trying to feed his son and simultaneously display his indignation over her eavesdropping.

This didn't bother Beverly though. For long ago she had figured out that Guinan always eavesdropped. She simply accepted it as part and parcel of what made Guinan, Guinan.

"We still sense each other," Beverly observed.

"The connection will increase or decrease depending upon the kind of emotions that you are sharing. Even the Betazeds experience this kind of ebb and flow in the intensity of their psychic links."

"You seem to know a lot about it," Jean-Luc grumbled.

"_Johnny, _I've been around a long time. I've encountered this situation myself with two of my former husbands - and then there was my Vulcan lover... But that's too long of a story to tell right now…" She sat down on the day bed, spreading her cerulean robes about her, on top of the dark blue galaxy patterned quilt. "Just as the twins are learning that they must block your thoughts and emotions from their own, both of you are subconsciously learning how to isolate yourselves from each other - and the twins."

"But I don't want to lose them!" Beverly was worried by what Guinan was implying.

"Beverly, you will always be their mother. You will always be linked to them in some manner. But first - and they must learn how to do this - your twins are learning how to keep other minds from intruding uninvited, into their own minds - and how to share their thoughts or emotions whenever they wish to do so." Guinan straightened out some pleats to her skirt even as she was momentarily distracted by an error in one of the star patterns to the quilt. She shrugged that off. "Just as you and Jean-Luc have had to acquire the skills to do so. The Picard family is just simply _learning, _right now. And when I leave, you'll have Ryllis and Lwaxana to guide you when you need extra help.

"You're leaving?" Jean-Luc grouchily queried. He was startled by the lack of a sense of security he felt he was losing if Guinan left. He didn't want her to go just yet. "When?"

"When the _Enterprise _gets here. Officially they're coming in to take on a trade commission envoy, and to get a slight refit on some thrusters or Heisenberg converters or whatever. I'm sure that whatever it is, Winnie came up with a good enough excuse to get Will Riker here in time for the christening…"

"_Christening?"_

The way that Jean-Luc crisply over-enunciated this word confirmed everything that Guinan had been suspecting about the upcoming festivity. And Jean-Luc's current lack of knowledge about it.

The husband sent an accusatory stare at his bride.

She boldly stared right back. "Jean-Luc, why do you think Marie has been here almost every day this week? And it wasn't just for more of Ludvig's crème brulee." She harrumphed. Her daughter giggled. "Why do I have the feeling that you've been ignoring the messages from your brother again?" She archly added. "Let me guess. You were intending to read them at a more convenient time…"

Since that was the precise, truthful explanation, Jean-Luc grumbled a bit. And then he focused all his attention on his son, who had been making escalating sounds of distress. He rose and took him over to the changing table where he proceeded to change his son's diaper.

Guinan sighed. And then, in what could be described as a stage whisper, announced, "There is nothing quite so pleasing as seeing a man change a diaper. Ranks right up there with a man doing housecleaning." She noticed the strategic placement of a cloth to prevent any pissing accidents. "It's even better when it's a Starfleet admiral doing the diaper changing - make that a Starfleet admiral with baby _experience_, no less."

Beverly couldn't stifle her laugh. "Holt changed a diaper earlier too. I should have taken vids. Junior officers, not to mention captains, across the galaxy could be spending hours trying to figure out how anyone could have faked such an event, for I doubt if anyone who has met Holt would have ever thought that Holt would or could do such a thing."

"It is not the place of the Fleet Admiral of Starfleet to be doing such things. Why didn't our nanny do it?" Jean-Luc grumbled.

"Because Ryllis was busy elsewhere. And because Holt occasionally likes to be reminded of the basic things in life now and then," Beverly explained, even as some of her mirth burbled forth. The look on Jean-Luc's face was priceless for he doubted that even Will Riker would believe this one.

"Though, the probability of Holt changing a diaper again during this millennia, is pretty slim." Guinan just had to add "Unless, Lwaxana gets pregnant of course. I wouldn't put _anything_ past that ambassadress…"

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

All was quiet in the nursery. After dinner, Beverly had headed straight toward their bedroom to try and get some sleep. For it was Jean-Luc's turn, according to the posted schedule on the door to the hallway, to feed and take care of the twins this night.

Actually, Jean-Luc Picard was enjoying his quiet time with his children. The lights were set at thirty percent illumination. One of Bach's 'English Suites for Keyboard' could be heard being played softly in the background. And both babies were peacefully sleeping. Jean-Luc was seated between the cribs, slowly rocking each crib back and forth, simply absorbing and appreciating the moment.

And the former captain of the _Enterprise_ was still having a hard time actually comprehending that he was a father and that these were his children. There was still a part of his psyche that still believed that such a thing would never happen to him. It was a belief that had survived in his soul for decades Yet, here he was, with both hands on the cradles as it were. Oh, he knew that he still missed his big chair. But he also knew that if Beverly had had the babies on board his former ship, he would have left anyway for he acknowledged to himself that he just could not have lived with his children on board any ship facing the dangers that he knew from space faring.

From the doorway, Wesley lightly cleared his throat. "May I come in, Jean-Luc?"

He nodded. "They seem to be sound asleep at the moment."

Wesley carefully walked over and peered into each cradle. Then he smiled as he sat down on the empty rocker. "I know I didn't have a cradle when I was a baby. But Mom did have this swinging basket that I really loved."

Jean-Luc chuckled. "I remember. You used to cry when she tried to take you out of it and put you in your crib. I think you spent your first two years sleeping in that basket."

"You were around when I was a baby?" Wesley had not really realized this.

"Whenever your father and I had shore leave around wherever your mother was, Beverly would always invite me over for at least one home cooked meal - regardless of how busy or exhausted she was from all her medical duties and everything." Jean-Luc chuckled in remembrance. "She usually fixed soup or spaghetti. When you grew into your toddler stage, both were you favorite meals. As for myself, I was just happy to be eating real food prepared by your mother. I treasured those dinners, the company, the laughter and the cut-throat poker games…"

"Mom was a good cook, but you should have tasted my Nana's cooking…"

Jean-Luc laughed more loudly. "A few times your mother tried making some of your Nana's recipes. There was this one cheese dish with beer…"

"The Welsh rarebit. Mom was always trying to improve it…"

"And she scorched it every time. At least, every time when I was around to eat it." Jean-Luc laughed loud enough to disturb the babies, but not enough to actually wake them. After shushing them back to quietude, Jean-Luc casually asked, "Are you staying the night, Wesley?"

"Yes. But the real reason as to why I came is because I think I know who the stealth programmer is - and it's not a cadet."

Jean-Luc's eyes widened in surprise.

Wesley continued, "That's why no cadet took you up on your claim of amnesty."

"Are you sure?"

"Pretty sure, Jean-Luc. Mr. Murphy and Mrs. Krebs are at any rate. They'll discuss it with you in the morning. In fact, Mrs. Krebs wants to go talk with the perpetrator tomorrow."

"Who is it?"

"Someone smarter than me, I think. She is a senior in high school at Our Lady of Star of Seas in San Francisco."

Jean-Luc blinked. "Our perpetrator is a _female Catholic high-school student?"_

"Yes. And she has never even applied for entrance into the Academy. Though she does have a half-brother who is a second year cadet at the Academy."

Jean-Luc blinked some more. "Do you have any idea as to _why _this _teenager_ hacked our programming?"

"I hate to say this, Jean-Luc, but…" Wesley paused for a moment, and then grinned. "I think that she is one of your neighbor's kids. If she's like other hackers I, uh er, may have occasionally encountered, she just simply saw it as a challenge. Mildred will sort the truth out, I'm sure."

"What is there to sort out?" Jean-Luc grumbled, somewhat disturbed by the thought that Mr. Data's programming had been hacked by a teenage girl…

"Well, I think that Mrs. Krebs and Commander S'Rock want to convince her to apply to the Academy, amongst other things."

Jean-Luc raised an eyebrow. "Without even meeting her yet? We shall see…" He glanced over at his children. They were still slumbering so he returned his attention back to Wesley.

Wesley settled back into his rocker. "There's something else, Jean-Luc."

"What, Wes?"

"Admiral Wiley has offered me a position as one of his junior adjutants after I graduate."

Jean-Luc merely nodded, not that surprised by Wesley's words for Beverly had mentioned to him some of Holt's earlier discussion with her. "I see."

"Guinan told me to take it."

With this bit of news Jean-Luc raised an eyebrow. "I must admit that I have usually found Guinan's advice to be sound advice over the years. There is some merit to Holt's offer."

"But I was looking forward to returning to the _Enterprise."_

Jean-Luc stood and went to his stepson and rested his hand on the boy's shoulder. "Wesley, only you can make this decision for yourself. I can see advantages for you with all of your offers."

"If I accept Holt's offer, I still will be able to work with Dr. Brahms." Wesley glanced over at the sleeping babies. "And I'd be able to see my family a lot more often, too." His grin was mischievous as he added, "And I think you are going to need a lot of help with these two."

"You're probably correct."

Wesley stood and squarely faced his stepfather. "What would you do, Jean-Luc?"

"An _Enterprise_ posting is a very rare offer. You know that, Wes."

"But a position with the Fleet Admiral?" Wes whispered. "I'd be a fool to say no…"

"You might be a fool if you accepted. Holt is not the most amiable of task masters."

Wesley nervously chuckled - over something.

"What?"

"Well, Jean-Luc, neither were you… And if I survived being under your command…," he teased. For Wesley's relationship with his stepfather had been improving over the past few months, to the point where he could tease the man (though not the officer just yet).

Jean-Luc ruefully acknowledged to himself that he just might have a reputation for difficulty that possibly rivaled Holt's legendary obstinate reputation. Jean-Luc briefly embraced Jack's son. "You'll know what to do when the time comes, Wesley. Follow your own path. Whichever you choose, I will support you." He squeezed the boy's shoulder before he returned to his rocker. "I think you can guess which choice your mother would really prefer you to make…"

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

Jean-Luc was still slightly snoring when Beverly silently slipped out of their bed. She marveled at the way that she felt, as she donned a soft peach cotton robe. It was a most unusual feeling. She actually felt rested. She'd probably gotten close to seven hours of sleep last night. It had been months since she'd achieved such a goal. But right now, her body was telling her that it was time to feed her babies.

When she entered the nursery, she wasn't that surprised to see Ryllis there, feeding a squirming William Alexander. A glance over at Anna told Beverly that her daughter was still slumbering in her cradle.

"William woke up first this morning," Ryllis whispered even as she watched Beverly matter-of-factly express her milk and prepare it for later feedings. "The forty-sixty mix seemed to be the working formula," she added as she observed Beverly making notes on a padd. "Both babies are thriving."

"Good. I still want Anna to have more breast milk than formula though, when we can. Her weight is still under the norm for her age."

"Agreed." Ryllis handed William Alexander to his mother. The baby immediately quieted down when he felt his mother's arms about him. He was no longer hungry. He just liked being held by his mother.

"Let her sleep," Beverly instructed as she sat down in her rocker.

"Shall I bring your breakfast in here?" Ryllis asked, as she tidied up the room.

"No. Just a cup of coffee for now. Decaf unfortunately."

"Actually, you could probably have a cup of regular coffee right now for you won't physically be feeding the twins until later on today."

Beverly's eyes brightened up. "You're right. Real coffee it is, then."

Ryllis softly laughed as she exited the room.

After a little while, one baby fell asleep as the other stirred in her cradle. Lightly laughing, Beverly switched babies; then she changed her daughter's diaper, and gave her a bottle. By the time that Ryllis had returned with her coffee, Beverly found herself really enjoying her morning.

A little while later, after leaving the twins in Ryllis' care, Beverly entered the dressing room, took a quick shower, and then dressed for the day. When Jean-Luc joined her, she lightly kissed him, told him what she'd already done that morning, and then permitted him to escort her to their breakfast room.

He wasn't that surprised to see Mildred already standing by the sideboard picking out what she wanted for breakfast from the covered entrée dishes.

"There's oatmeal and fresh strawberries," she announced as she carried a bowl and a plate back to her place setting.

"The usual?" Jean-Luc asked of his wife as she sat down and poured hot Irish breakfast tea into two cups, then placed the cups and saucers in front of her place setting as well as Jean-Luc's setting. Beverly nodded as she then poured a cup of coffee for Mildred.

A few moments later Jean-Luc returned with a large plate and bowl laden with pancakes, sausage, scrambled eggs, oatmeal and strawberries. Beverly immediately poured syrup on her pancakes and then milk on her cereal.

After getting his own breakfast, Jean-Luc sipped his tea. It was only the gleam in Beverly's eye that prevented Jean-Luc from spitting the tea out. She'd switched his tea deliberately.

"I just thought that I'd broaden your horizons," she simply explained.

"Don't broaden them too much, madam. If you start serving me any of the lap song smoked teas, I will gift them back to you," he threatened.

"Uh-huh," was Beverly's response as she bit into a scone slathered with apricot jam.

A while later, with barely concealed amusement, Jean-Luc watched as mother and son continued to consume a prodigious amount of food. Beverly finally noticed his look. "You try breastfeeding twins. You'd be eating an additional twenty-five hundred calories a day too!"

Mildred interrupted this not exactly witty repartee and briefed him on his day's events, and her planned trip to visit the hacker.

"I'll go with you," Jean-Luc announced, as if he hadn't already made up his mind to do so. "Should we take her brother?"

"I don't think that Charles actually participated in the hacking, Jean-Luc, but I have a feeling that he surely knew about it," Wesley casually stated, interjecting himself into this topic of conversation for the first time. "He came to me shortly after Christmas and sorted of hinted around about it."

"And you didn't see fit to tell me?" Jean-Luc's tone was curter than he had meant it to be.

"I didn't have anything concrete to report, Jean-Luc," Wes calmly replied. "Besides, you were concerned about other matters by then."

Knowing that this was especially true, Jean-Luc nodded at Mildred and Wesley. "Until later then." He eyed his stepson. "You will join us and bring Cadet Winchester with you."

Jean-Luc nodded, lightly kissed Beverly on the forehead, and then briskly walked out of the room toward the transporter room. He was running a bit late this morning.

"Admiral Picard in a snitty mood. That will put the fear of Starfleet in the young lady," Mildred observed. "Well, if we don't want the girl to run away and join the Klingons, we'd better get there early, use her brother and talk to her, and then let Jean-Luc know where we are."

Beverly didn't say a word. She just knew that she would wait to see how the day would play out, for considering what had happened at the Christmas party, she was perfectly willing for the girl to tremble in her shoes; to be the sole recipient of Admiral Jean-Luc Picard's righteous wrath.

What the admiral didn't know was that the teenager was off touring several university campuses on Alpha Centauri, Clarion and Vulcan. It would be a while before she was back in San Francisco.

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

Things were not going well in the nursery. Not that Jean-Luc was panicking. (Just yet.)

_Even though they were his children, they were still only babies, after all. Just how much havoc - er, damage could they achieve in a few short hours? _

Though why Beverly just had to go shopping with Marie this afternoon was beyond Jean-Luc's ken at the moment_. _

_And why the devil wasn't she back yet?_

It was Ryllis' afternoon off as well as Jean-Luc's. So he had volunteered to tend to his children since both Guinan and Lwaxana were also busy doing something. They had not bothered to inform him as to exactly what it was that was so important that they had to leave him all alone with his daughter and son - with no back up.

For some incomprehensible reason, both babies were energetically bawling their heads off.

_Non-stop_.

Which, considering that he had changed their diapers, rocked them, fed them, held them, bounced them, burped them, pleaded with them, ordered them, and even sung to them - he still could not fathom as to why they were still so energetically crying. None of the techniques that he'd learned from his Kataanian family experience were working…

He tried to sense them, and figure out why they were so upset. But other than wailing their lungs out, the twins gave their father not a clue as to the source of their discontentment.

_So much for Beverly's belief that they would know why the babies were crying…_

Jean-Luc was impressed that his daughter, who was normally such a quiet baby, was currently out-yowling her brother by quite a few decibels. He was holding her in his arms and resting her head on his shoulder, rocking from side to side. Anna reacted to being held in her father's arms. Anna spit up again. All of it trailed down Jean-Luc's back. Jean-Luc decided that he had not quite burped Anna long enough.

_Either that or his daughter had just simply wanted to spit up all over his shirt. _

_Again. _

He held Anna and tried to clean her up (for he'd given up worrying about the status of his own clothing over an hour ago). He was trying to quiet William Alexander as well, by rocking the cradle with his foot. Because he didn't wish to mess up the rocker with the sticky, sopping back of his shirt not to mention whatever it was that was now seeping into the pocket of his pants, Jean-Luc was standing on one foot trying to manipulate the William Alexander's rocker with his other foot. He was also trying to sing '_Freres Jacque' _at the same time_. _

Lwaxana Adele Marie was unimpressed. She kept on crying.

Around the corner from the nursery, a group of ladies stood in the baby overflow storage room, doing their best not to laugh out loud as they watched a desk monitor displaying all the messy details of Jean-Luc Picard's plight.

"Jean-Luc can multi-task," Kate Pulaski observed, not bothering to disguise her glee. "Who'd a thunk it…"

Meanwhile, back in the nursery, Jean-Luc suddenly sniffed the air. He became aware that Anna needed her diaper changed one more time. But experience had taught him something, so he sniffed the air again. _Make that two babies who needed their diapers changed_. He no longer doubted the power of the twin-ship connection between his son and daughter, even as he grabbed two clean onesies from the armoire. He didn't bother about picking the right colors for each child. He was beyond that conceit now. Jean-Luc just needed to dress his twins into something clean - right now.

Captain Kate Pulaski was observing all of this on the monitor in the baby's storage room along with Guinan, Lwaxana and Mildred.

"Well, that answers the important question," Guinan observed, after considering the situation for a while.

Kate agreed. "Beverly's going to have to figure out how to wean herself from her babies' presence. The twins will have to learn how to live without being in their mother's presence twenty-four hours a day."

"But they've never been apart from Beverly before," Lwaxana protested. "It is too soon for my Little Ones…" She glared at Kate. "They've been tethered to their mother since their consciousnesses were formed. They don't know how to be away from the touch of their mother's mind. They're afraid."

"But shouldn't the presence of their father be a comfort to them?" Kate asked, puzzled as to why the babies were continuing to give voice to their displeasure.

Guinan chuckled. "Oh, it does. But the darlings also know how malleable he is. They're just showing him their unhappiness. Beverly will put a stop to it when she returns."

"Why don't you?" Kate asked, with only a slight touch of acidity hidden in her voice.

"Is their wailing causing them any physical harm?" Guinan quietly asked.

Kate checked the monitors. "No."

"Then let them tucker themselves out. Won't do them any harm. And it will give Beverly and Jean-Luc a chance to get more than a couple of hours of sleep tonight - that is, if Jean-Luc manages to survive." Guinan raised an eyebrow to see if Kate would protest her assessment.

"We're so cruel doing this to him," Lwaxana observed, even as she was mentally trying to order her goddaughter to calm down. Her namesake did not comply.

"I know," was all that Guinan stated.

Kate snorted.

Guinan then added, "Beverly will be home soon."

Mildred observed what William Alexander then did next to his father. "Not soon enough for Jean-Luc," she observed.

Beverly did indeed come home soon - though not as soon as Jean-Luc would have wished.

The minute that she walked into the nursery, the babies stopped their wailing.

It took Jean-Luc a moment to realize that the cacophony had ceased. And as to why there was now blessed calm.

Beverly gazed at her husband with a pleasant albeit self-satisfied smile on her face, observed his somewhat bedraggled and frazzled condition, noted the multiple stains on his clothing, and then strove to ask as casually as she could, "How goes it?" in her best, nonchalant tone of voice.

"Beverly…," he warned, sensing just how hard his wife was trying to keep from laughing out loud. He was also trying to silently convey to her just how close he was to losing his legendary control.

She picked up a towel and wiped some spit-up from the top of a cradle. "I see that our little darlings have missed their mother." With this statement, she swept her son out of his cradle, and then reached for her daughter.

Both parents were totally surprised when instead of turning for her mother, Anna held up her arms and patted her father's jaw. Then she plopped her head back down against his shoulder and promptly fell asleep. This little darling was exhausted. And Jean-Luc was momentarily stunned by the height and depth of overwhelming feeling that flowed through his body as he watched his daughter nap. He had not realized how his love for his daughter could grow exponentially…

It was Jean-Luc who placed his daughter on her back in the crib; then he turned on the starship mobile above her head.

Beverly continued to wipe up the many spots that Jean-Luc had missed, and then eventually sat down on her rocker with her son in her arms. After feeding William Alexander, and then placing him in his crib, Beverly and Jean-Luc quietly tidied up the nursery. It needed it.

Then, with a slap to his derriere, Beverly sent her husband off to take a shower and to put on some clean clothes.

Beverly went to the library where she met with the ladies who had been monitoring the twins. They were all seated by a tea trolley in front of the fireplace.

"Have fun shopping with Marie?" Mildred asked.

"We had a very nice time. I spent a lot of latinum, found a dress to wear for the christening since I know that I haven't lost as much of the baby weight as I would have wished, and we had a wonderful lunch at that little Italian place off of Ghiradelli square."

"You'd better have brought back chocolate," Mildred warned.

Beverly gave them all a knowing grin. "Indeed I did. Ludvig is turning it into a chocolate _surprise_ even as we speak."

"Good," Kate Pulaski replied. "I haven't officially moved out yet so I'll stay for dinner. And dessert."

"Was it as I suspected?" Beverly asked; her thoughts turning to more serious matters.

"Yes, Beverly." Dr. Pulaski handed the admiral her padd. "The moment you were beyond the house grounds, the twins started acting up. At first, they were together in their wailing. Everyone in the area could certainly hear them."

"The gardener mowed the lawn today - a day early," Mildred added.

Kate ignored her. "But after a while, they alternated between crying and resting. A tag team as it were. I don't think that Jean-Luc figured that one out just yet."

Beverly read the data on the padd. "They were quite determined to make their displeasure known to their father, weren't they..."

"Both of them are figuring out how to manipulate Jean-Luc just fine," Lwaxana observed. "It's as it should be. Though of course my namesake also has him wrapped around her little finger too."

"Yes, I'd noticed that." Beverly kept reading her padd.

Mildred poured Beverly a cup of tea. "Why don't the twins get upset when their father leaves them?"

"Jean-Luc always has left them since the very first time that their minds touched ours. He has always had to go to work. And do his duty." Beverly took a few quick sips from her cup. "Whereas with me, even when I went to work, I was still carrying them around with me."

Lwaxana reached over and patted Beverly's knee. "Your children will always wish to be with their mother."

"But that's not practical," Guinan advised as she entered the room.

Mildred nodded. "I agree."

Lwaxana raised an eyebrow. "What if both you and Jean-Luc leave at the same time. What will happen then?"

"Replicate earplugs?" Mildred suggested.

Lwaxana ignored her. "I don't recall leaving Deanna alone for the first year of her life…"

"Nothing." Ryllis answered the question when she entered the room, automatically accepting a cup of tea from Mildred. "If they are anything like Betazed babies with _normal_ mothers, once they know that both parents are out of immediate reach, they'll just look around for closer minds to contact."

Beverly raised her eyes up to look at Ryllis. "I thought that there would always be some sort of psychic connection between my children and their parents."

"There is," Ryllis agreed as she sat down on the edge of the chaise lounge. "But if the twins subscribe to Betazoid norms, to sense across great distances it will take a certain combination of hormones and adrenalin to achieve it. And even then the connection may be on a sub-conscious level since both you and Jean-Luc are not natural-born telepaths."

"I could just give you an '_on and off' _switch," a disembodied voice announced from the terrace doorway suggested.

"That might work, Q," Guinan stated, shocking this member of the Continuum down to his very toes after he materialized in the library. For Guinan was acting as if this member of the Continuum popping in and out was now normal, accepted behavior.

"An _'on and off' _switch," Lwaxana mused. "That explains a lot about your psychic connections."

Beverly eyed Jean-Luc's personal imp as he plopped himself down on the corner of the sofa and snapped his fingers. A moment later he was holding a large glass of what appeared to be brandy.

The look of longing on Lwaxana's face was enough for him to materialize a bottle of Napoleon brandy and glasses onto the top of the tea table. He didn't have to suggest that the ladies should help themselves for Lwaxana immediately began pouring the brandy into snifters.

"Oh, I saw the antique christening gowns," Q pleasantly said to Beverly, as he watched the Lwaxana, amused by the Betazed's activities.

"Marie showed them to you?" Beverly was very surprised by this bit of news. She had not known that Q had been visiting LaBarre without Jean-Luc's presence.

"Yes, lovely Brussels lace. And the caps - I think that Marie described them as 'Irish wedding veil' - whatever that means."

Beverly absentmindedly nodded her head. "That's lace so fine that you can pull it through a wedding ring." She was still trying to understand all the data that Dr. Pulaski had compiled. And then, she didn't even want to think about the likelihood of Q and Marie becoming bosom buddies. That possibility was something that she'd leave solely for Jean-Luc to envisage.

"Marie said that one gown was from the 18th century and that the other was hand-made by one of Jean-Luc's ancestors in the late 19th century. I must admit that I was impressed by such ancestral continuity. The Continuum doesn't have such fine old traditions."

"Maybe you should suggest it to them," Guinan remarked as she picked up the brandy bottle to pour herself another glass.

"I will the next time that Mrs. Q and I procreate. Maybe Jean-Luc will give us one of his ancestral gowns for a 'christening'." Q relaxed against the comfy brown leather tufted back of the Chesterfield sofa. He was wearing a somewhat conservative (for him) red hunting jacket, jodhpurs and Knee-high purple leather boots.

Beverly suspected that even though Q could create any kind of equine creature in the universe, at one point during this afternoon, he was going to try and borrow one of Jean-Luc's beloved horses. She just hoped that Jean-Luc would not have a conversation with Q about horses around the twins if they were still napping.

Guinan abruptly put down her glass against the tea table. "Wait a second, Q. Are you telling me that you and Mrs. Q have reconciled? _And _that you have a son?"

Q stuck out his tongue at her.

Guinan considered this response, noted that it was all that he did, and nodded. "Maybe you are maturing after all, Q."

Beverly dropped her padd onto her lap. "Now what do I do?" she asked the group as if Q weren't there conversing with them.

"You're just going to have to teach them boundaries," Q ordered. "After all, they can't have everything they want when they want it. They don't know yet that they are not the center of the universe."

"Why, if they were, well, that would make them just like the Q!" Mildred muttered under her breath. "And we wouldn't want that…"

Q heard her anyway. He sent a particularly icy glare in Mildred's direction.

It did not ruffle a hair on the lady's head.

"And we wouldn't want that just yet, now would we?" he mockingly echoed before he disappeared.

Beverly rested against the side of her chaise lounge. There was a continuing undercurrent to Q's observations about her children that she didn't quite understand. And she didn't really want to comprehend what it meant, either. But it bothered her. She most definitely was going to have to have another private conversation with him. But she put that thought aside when Jean-Luc came down the circular staircase. He had changed his clothing and was now wearing an olive shirt and khaki pants. She detected the slight scent of bayberry rum and citrus as he moved closer to her. He must have shaved and showered as well. For a moment, she simply admired the sight of him.

Then he spoke.

"I take it that you've gained some answers from your little medical - and social - experiment?" Jean-Luc Picard somewhat formally asked as he pulled a chair next to Beverly's side of the chaise lounge. He automatically accepted a cup of tea from Lwaxana.

"Why, Jean-Luc, whatsoever do you mean?" Lwaxana was laying her innocence act on thick with a trowel.

He sent a quelling glare in Lwaxana's direction, capable of dampening cadet misbehavior at a thousand paces. He hid his surprise when he saw that it actually worked. _Lwaxana must be feeling just a little bit guilty…_

Guinan only chuckled. "What gave us away?"

"While it is conceivable that all of you could be busy at the exact same time, making me the only babysitter available - I know my wife." The ladies chewed on that bald-faced statement for a moment.

"Meaning?" Beverly calmly asked.

"There's only one reason as to why you would leave the twins solely in my charge for a morning."

"And that would be?" The look she bestowed upon her husband was a pleasant one.

"Because you had to leave."

Beverly raised an eyebrow.

Her husband continued with his explanation. "And since you won't be on active duty for a few more months…." He paused and considered the soundness of his argument before he continued speaking. "And since there is no crisis concerning Wesley of which I am aware, there can only be one reason as to why you left me alone with our children, _mon coeur."_

"Cut to the chase, Sherlock," Guinan ordered.

Beverly cast an annoyed look in Guinan's direction. She liked it when her husband played detective, even if it was at her expense.

"Please continue, _darling."_ She made a point of emphasizing her pet name for Jean-Luc.

Jean-Luc almost smiled in response to his wife's request. "You wanted me to be alone with my children, presumably to see the kind of chaos which would ensue. But since I do not believe that you have a malicious streak - at least when it comes to me, unlike certain other ladies in this room…" Two ladies did slightly shift in their seats. "…there must have been a specific, important reason as to why you did leave me alone with my children. And it was not just to instruct me again about my hubris."

"So?" Kate brightly asked. "I've learned to ignore your hubris" she just had to comment.

He ignored Kate. "You wished to see how the twins would react when you left them alone."

Beverly nodded. "I thought to start out with you going solo. And then to see what happened when I left them alone with their godmother, Mildred, Ryllis, etc."

He nodded in understanding. "You wanted to see how Anna and William Alexander would be away from your presence."

Ryllis suddenly spoke up. "It's the way that Betazeds wean their children from the constant mental contact with their mothers. A little bit at a time. And the sooner you begin this process, the easier it is for the baby as time goes on." She pointedly stared at Lwaxana. "Unfortunately, not all Betazed mothers do so, which can lead to all sorts of other problems with the child later on in life."

"Tell me about it," Lwaxana muttered. "Once my daughter joined Starfleet, all of her problems really began…"

Mildred snorted. Her sip of tea went down the wrong way.

Jean-Luc politely waited until Mildred stopped coughing before he continued. "Of course, the first time I heard Dr. Pulaski's cackle emanating from down the hallway, I immediately surmised as to why I was the sole caregiver to my children at the moment." He took another sip of his perfectly brewed tea. He was pleased to note that it was Earl Grey. He suspected that Beverly had been expecting him to join them. "Of course, knowing that all of you were down the hall, somewhat enjoying the moment at my expense, did not alter the way that I reacted at all." He put down his cup and saucer. "At some point in the future, I will deal with each and every one of you in my own way."

Dr. Pulaski turned toward Beverly. "Dr. Crusher, unless you have reason for me to be here other than our friendship, I think that I'd better more out and get back home tomorrow. I need to get on with the business of our hospital fleet ships any way. I need to get away from life's annoyances."

"That might be wise," Jean-Luc calmly agreed. He kept his satisfied smile to himself.


	10. Chapter 10

_**De-Tached: Story 5: Life with Beverly**_

_**Chapter 10: Tradition!**_

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

Neither baby cried, though both were wide-eyed and attentive. Their gazes followed every movement as they looked about at the various new things that caught their eye.

Robert preferred to think that somehow his niece and nephew perceived the solemnity of their christening, and were behaving themselves like proper little Picards in their draping lace christening gowns and cute Dutch style lace caps.

Beverly knew otherwise. She just sensed that her twins were absolutely fascinated by all the happy, interesting new faces paying attention to them. Also, all of the pretty colored sunbeams that were streaming through the ancient stained glass windows of the Picard ancestral church, the church of Ste. Magdalena in LaBarre, were being noted. Those shifting rainbow sunbeams most definitely were tickling the curiosity of her babies. They barely noticed the blessed oil and the trickle of water on their foreheads as they were baptized.

The official names of the babies were William Alexander Robert Picard and Lwaxana Adele Marie Picard. William and Deanna were the godparents for Jean-Luc's son. Marie and Wesley were the godparents for Beverly's daughter. At least, those were the names listed on the baptismal certificate. Unofficially, the parents had added to that list the 'fairy' godparents that included Winston Holt Wiley, Lwaxana Troi Wiley, Guinan, Mr. Data, Robert Picard, Mildred Krebs, and, of course, Q.

Jean-Luc had protested in private about Q's involvement. All Guinan had to say was that she thought that it would be a good thing for the twins to have Q as an honorary godfather. And that in return, she would keep an eye on Q for him. Though not totally reassured, Jean-Luc had to accept Guinan's word about keeping Q under control.

Jean-Luc also quickly came to realize that if he desired a less-contentious life when it came to the twins, if Beverly thought that Q as a fairy godfather was a good idea for their children, then he'd better agree to such an impossibility as well.

Jean-Luc did the only thing that he could do at this solemn moment as the priest asked the godparents the traditional faith questions; he put his arm around his wife's waist, absentmindedly noting how pretty she looked wearing a simple ivory lace suit with his granmere's sapphire and diamond brooch attached at the shoulder. He focused on the sheer enormity of the fact that these were his children being baptized in his ancestral family church - where he had been baptized. Somehow that which he had considered an impossibility for most of his adult life, had now come true. _He was a father_.

He glanced over at the Picard ancestral memorial west of the nave, observing the ancient marble statue of a vigilant Archangel Michael protecting the crest of the Comte d'Holl. He noted that the statue had only accumulated a few more chips during the decades that he had been absent. Thinking of his family, an unbidden thought entered his consciousness as he considered the possibility that maybe he had finally accomplished something of which his father would approve. Pride grew within his breast.

Wesley answered the priest's questions outright, since technically, he was a baptized Catholic. Though the Church's rules about godparents had changed dramatically over the centuries and had been relaxed considerably, this officiating priest was glad that Marie Picard was also one of the official godparents since she was an active member of his parish, and he knew that she would abide by the baptismal promises to the best of her ability. The priest was also satisfied by the knowledge that the babies would be spending time in LaBarre, so that he could keep an eye on them as well. Not that Pere Etienne questioned the moral fortitude of the parents. Though he didn't know the mother that well, he'd known the Picard family for decades. And what he knew of as well as learned of Jean-Luc Picard's character, confirmed his belief that when it came to character, Jean-Luc Picard's was beyond reproach.

Wesley was taking his duty as godfather quite seriously. Though he didn't wish to openly acknowledge it, he suspected that he would live a lot longer than Jean-Luc Picard. He would probably outlive his mother as well. And so, it would become his responsibility for the rest of his life to be big brother to Anna and William Alexander. And to make sure that the twins always knew that they were part of his family as well as part of the Picard family.

A few moments later, they were all standing at the top of the steps to the church as Reginald Barclay took vids.

Jean-Luc and Beverly were both touched that a good many of their former _Enterprise_ crew had taken the time out of their shore leaves to attend the baptism. Add into this mix their friends and associates from the Academy, Starfleet Medical, the Admiralty, and their LaBarre friends and neighbors as well, and there was a rather large crowd in attendance at the Picard christening celebration.

Not that Marie and Robert were not up to the challenge of hosting such an event. The well-used ancient oak harvest tables were set up under tents in the courtyards by the Château and the wineries. Ludvig's Belgian cousin Nils Nyqvist who owned the restaurant where Ludvig used to join him to cook experimentally, catered this event along with Ludvig's help, of course.

As all the guests left the churchyard, Jean-Luc grasped Beverly's hand and suggested, "It's a wonderful day. Let's walk back. Will and Deanna can shepherd the twins."

Beverly smiled in sympathy with her husband. But she had to deny him. "I'm afraid that we are part of the festivities, Jean-Luc. We can't take the time to walk, unfortunately." She lightly kissed his cheek. "We'll be back to normal soon enough. Then we can renew our walks." She glanced over at Captain Riker who was still holding her daughter. Anna had both of her little fists clutching Will's beard for dear life. And from the expression on Will's face, Beverly suspected that her daughter was not about to let go of Will's facial hair any time soon. She found that amusing, and nudged her husband to look in Will's direction.

After observing Will's predicament, and mentally noting that sometimes the gods extracted a high price for being irresistible to females of all ages, Jean-Luc returned to the conversation he'd been attempting to have with his wife. "I sincerely doubt that we will ever know what is 'normal' ever again," he grumbled back, although he was not bothering to hide his smile as he gazed into his beloved's blue eyes.

"Well, Lwaxana and Holt did say that they were moving out after the christening."

Over this statement, Jean-Luc laughed out loud even as he escorted Beverly into their waiting hover car. "Beverly, I am not going to hold my breath waiting for that event to occur." He glanced over to where the Fleet Admiral of Starfleet was goo-gooing at 'Warp Speed' Picard who was being held in Lwaxana's arms. "One can only hope that the terrible twos will drive Winston Holt Wiley out of our house, eventually."

Beverly clutched her husband's arm as she sat down. "Please, Jean-Luc. Let me cling to my foolish hope of having Lwaxana depart from Picard House as soon as possible, just like she promised."

"You don't mind Holt's presence?" He was curious about her reasoning.

"Oh, Holt is easy to handle. When he starts to get outrageous, all I have to do is discuss the date of his next annual physical. And maybe I might throw in some reference of some special test that I might wish to run. He usually stops doing whatever it was that I found annoying whenever I do that." She shuddered. "But Lwaxana? No one can control her. Which I am sure is something that Holt has well-learned by now."

Jean-Luc chuckled over both of her observations. "I am glad to know that I am not the only officer that you habitually tyrannize with the threat of a physical."

"Why, Jean-Luc, you're not afraid of me, are you? Not that I would ever do such a thing to you anymore…" Beverly batted her beautiful blue eyes in his direction, even as she coyly answered this question, "…though it is standard operating procedure for the good CMOs considering how recalcitrant officers with four pips or higher are when it comes to their health."

"I would be a fool, not to be afraid of you when you are in your CMO mode," he countered, even as he was momentarily distracted by his love's flirting.

"And you're no fool," she concluded even as she leaned over to kiss him, albeit quickly since their car was now pulling into the château's courtyard.

Mildred greeted their hover car. "After lunch, your problems will be solved," she cryptically informed them as she led them through their guests over to the head table.

Jean-Luc put his hand on Beverly's skirt as he slightly walked behind her. Beverly was about to pull away from his touch when she felt a soft pat on her derriere. She flinched. Then her husband's arm moved around her waist. After glancing in Jean-Luc's direction, she had the sneaking suspicion that her husband had not even realized that he'd patted her ass in public. Or that he had noted her reaction.

But someone else had. Lwaxana's eyes widened as she felt the jumble of emotions that Beverly was unknowingly projecting. The Betazoid ambassadress decided to have a little talk with Beverly before the end of the day.

And then they all sat down to a magnificent lunch. From the captains to the ambassadors to the neighbors to the friends to the relations, all were surprised by just how good the food was. It was a very enjoyable and delicious feast. Naturally followed with some of the best wine that the vineyard (or France) had to offer. The after lunch salutes to the health of the new additions to the Picard family were many. Some were occasionally long-winded, some were examples of witty brevity, but most often, the toasts were simply, truly heartfelt.

And Jean-Luc relished every moment of all of it, occasionally grasping Beverly's hand as unexpected, overwhelming exultation flooded through his heart. He thought he knew the definition of what true happiness was before, in his past. _But now…_

Beverly shared her feelings with him as well. She had never wanted any more children except in her fantasies when she'd dreamed of a certain hazel-eyed starship captain fathering them. Yet now she was the mother of a son and a daughter in reality, fathered by the man of her dreams and longings. She was indeed happy - she should be happy. Yet, during the past seven weeks after their birth, she had experienced moments of self-doubt. _Uncertainty…_ She focused on the moment, even as she was enjoying the taste of the brut champagne; Beverly pushed aside her concerns, one more time.

After the long lunch was finally over, most of the guests followed Robert about as he led a tour through some of the vineyards. Robert's great pride in the vineyards was evident to all as his spoke about the ancestral Picard land. At the end of this tour, all of the guests would adjourn to the main winery building, where tastings of the Picard fine wines would be offered. Everyone was looking forward to this sampling.

It was then that Ludvig approached Winston Holt Wiley. Wiley was enjoying a post-luncheon brandy at a table in the courtyard since walking through a vineyard smelled of exercise which was something that Winston Holt Wiley tended to avoid at all costs. Sitting around waiting for the wine tasting to begin whilst drinking brandy was much more his preferred activity. Naturally, befitting the occasion, the brandy that he had chosen was one of Château Picard's finer offerings.

"Ludvig," Holt cordially greeted the chef, eyeing the bottle of brandy that the man was holding, and liking what he was seeing. "Superb feast. You outdid yourself - and that is saying something."

"Actually, Admiral, I didn't do it."

Startled, Holt paused in mid-sip. "What?"

Ludvig motioned for another man to join them about the café table in the courtyard. "Sir, may I introduce my cousin Nils?"

Holt put down his glass and stood to shake this man's hand. He examined this new chef before him and did not doubt in the slightest that this man was Ludvig's cousin. The family resemblance was quite strong. Both men were almost as round as they were tall, with ruddy faces, and eyes that twinkled with a great zest for life - and great food.

"Admiral Wiley, I am Nils Nyqvist." He shook the admiral's hand.

"Pleasure to meet you, sir." Holt finished off his brandy which Ludvig quickly refilled. "You prepared the feast?"

"Yes."

Ludvig chose this moment to inform the admiral that Nils was the owner of a rather famous European Union restaurant called 'La Marmite' near the Hague. Holt's eyes widened for he had eaten there in the past. And every visit had been a memorable gastronomic outing.

"You're not closing the restaurant, are you?" Holt hastily asked, since he had rather fond memories of dining there.

"No, Admiral. My two older sons are in charge of the restaurant now. And personally, I think that both of them are better chefs than I am." He shrugged his shoulders. "As for me, I am attempting to become used to being semi-retired." Then he grinned. "Now it is time for _me_ to cook and create _what I want_."

"I see," Holt speculatively replied, his little mental gears quickly clacking. Holt plunged feet first into a conclusion. "How _semi-retired _are you planning on becoming?"

Both cousins shared a grin for this was the specific question that they had really wanted to hear asked. Ludvig motioned at a patient waiter to bring over two empty Baccarat brandy snifters. The cut crystal sparkled in the afternoon sun as the pilfered, very special _Fine de la Marne _brandy was poured. Ludvig inwardly grinned, correctly guessing that Admiral Picard was not above cheerfully giving away a case of the very rare, very expensive stuff if it was used as an additional incentive for Admiral Winston Holt Wiley to get the hell out of Picard House and at last, return to his own home with his perpetually blushing bride.

Admiral Wiley motioned for the two chefs to sit down. "Nyqvist, eh?" Holt too-casually stated. More mental gears cranked. "There's a cadet at the Academy named Nyqvist…"

"Edvin. My youngest son," Nils amiably mentioned.

"I've heard nothing but good about the cadet," Holt informed the father who was pleased by this bit of information.

"He's the first of our family to ever join Starfleet," Ludvig added. "I fear that all of my stories about life on board the _Enterprise_ must have influenced the boy."

"Naturally. Still, I can recognize a father's desire to keep an eye on his teenage son," the admiral pleasantly observed.

"I do not wish to intrude into his life - yet I worry…"

Holt nodded his head. "I do understand." He sipped some more of the dark amber liquid gold (for the brandy was priced quite similar to the cost of gold latinum per gram). "I have sons myself - though they haven't lived with me in decades. That doesn't mean that I still don't keep track of them whether they like it or not." He sipped some more. "But at home? Right now, it's just Lwaxana and myself." Holt put down his glass. "Just the two of us - we'd not be too onerous a challenge for a superb chef, I would imagine."

"Actually, Admiral Wiley, the more demanding you are, the better. I may not feel like running an establishment as large as La Marmite on a daily basis anymore. But that doesn't mean that I would wish to be bored with my everyday life, either."

Holt chuckled at the thought of anyone being bored in his household. "You haven't met my wife, have you, Mr. Nyqvist?"

"Actually, I have met Ambassador Troi." Nyqvist sniffed.

Holt drank some more brandy, then remarked, "And you're still willing to come? I suppose that no one has ever described Lwaxana as boring."

"The lady's reputation precedes her. Not to mention her criticisms." The older chef chuckled. "I am not afraid. However, I actually wouldn't mind cooking for someone who respects my work, and might enjoy eating the results of my culinary experimentation. To be the first to taste and maybe even boast about my new epicurean creations…"

Holt shuddered in delight over this delicious possibility. He made up his mind and then stood, nodding at both of the master chefs. "Whatever you require or would like, Monsieur Nyqvist…" The Fleet Admiral of Starfleet chuckled. "You may have to dazzle the Federation Council or some dignitary now and then, but if you can keep my wife from experiencing ennui on a daily basis then everything I have is at your disposal. And you would have my undying appreciation." Holt looked over at Ludvig. "Can he make a crème brulee as good as yours?"

"He taught me how," Ludvig confessed.

Holt swiftly extended his hand to his new chef. "Are we agreed?"

"I am very expensive," Nils just had to warn.

"So am I," Holt chuckled. "Therefore, I can appreciate and value your cost. Plus I can afford to pay whatever you want, too."

"That's always good to know," Ludvig teased, as he patted his cousin on the back.

Nils nodded. "Agreed." Nils firmly shook the admiral's hand.

"How soon can you come?" Winston Hold Wiley just had to ask.

"Monday," Nils quickly answered.

Holt laughed some more as visions of bouillabaisse, ratatouille, gateau and Kladdkaka danced across his taste buds. There was but one more concern for the admiral. "Ludvig, let me tell Jean-Luc and Beverly about this transition, myself. I want to watch their response when I tell them that Lwaxana and I are finally moving home and out of Picard House." All three men nodded in understanding, and drank some more brandy before Holt added, "Nils, your first commission as my chef is to improve my wine and spirits collection. I think that you'll find that my wine cellar and liquor vault are more than adequate." " Holt looked about the stone-walled courtyard that opened out to a magnificent garden. "Nils, you can start here, first. Then we can visit some of the neighboring wineries tomorrow."

"Actually, I have already consulted a sommelier that I trust, Admiral Wiley, with just such a purpose in mind. Ludvig permitted me to scan the inventories of your spirits. And I must say that I was impressed…"

"Call me Winston…," the admiral replied.

Standing in the shadows by a side door, Guinan laughed to herself as she watched the admiral and the two chefs continue to heft a glass of brandy to each other, to food and to wine and more. "Jean-Luc won't know how to behave himself once you're gone, _Whiney_…"

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

In the calming atmosphere of the Picard ancestral nursery, Beverly rocked back and forth on a very old oak rocker, humming softly to her daughter as the child nursed at her mother's breast. The pale sage and ivory walls with inset panels of scenes from beloved Grimm fairy tales tickled Beverly's sense of whimsy. She also suspected that once Robert and Marie had learned of her pregnancy, that they had updated and refurbished the nursery anticipating frequent visits from the Picard twins. Beverly also knew that some of the plethora of baby shower gifts that she had received, were now being put to good use in this nursery too. She was quite touched by how well, not to mention how swiftly, she had become a welcomed member of the Picard family.

"She's catching up with 'Warp Speed', isn't she?" Lwaxana softly asked as she tiptoed into the room. She inspected her goddaughter once more, just to be on the safe side that all was well with this precious child. And she found everything to be satisfactory.

Beverly shushed her friend. "Don't let Jean-Luc hear you call William Alexander that nickname. He's been protesting about that name since the very first time that he heard it."

"Mildred nicknamed him, so he can only blame her," Lwaxana just had to add. "Holt only just picked up on it." She lightly brushed her fingers over the boy's pate before she knelt down next to Beverly. "And if Jean-Luc is willing to voice his protest to Mildred about it, well, we will just have to sell tickets when that spectacle happens. My latinum would be on Mildred."

Beverly tried not to laugh too loudly since William was peacefully napping. _And one should never disturb sleeping babies… _"So would mine."

Lwaxana continued. "Besides, Jean-Luc is just going to have to get used to the nickname for I sincerely doubt if the rest of the admiralty will stop calling your son 'Warp Speed', now. The boy is stuck with it for life."

"Well, as long as I don't call him that, Jean-Luc should be all right."

Lwaxana nodded. Then she observed, "You know, ever since you married him, Jean-Luc has been less of a - what is that quaint phrase that you humans say? - less of a stick in the ground?"

"You mean 'mud', I think." Beverly Picard nodded her head in agreement with Lwaxana's assessment.

"Or is it 'stick up in the ass'?" Lwaxana mischievously stated.

Beverly chose not to correct Lwaxana, even as she tried very hard not to disturb either baby with the laughter that was threatening to burble forth.

After William Alexander had settled down again, for a while the two ladies just sat there, watching the youngest Picard nurse. And when Anna started nodding off, she was expertly burped by her mother, and then put into yet another cherry wood crib for a nap.

Lwaxana motioned toward the shaded balcony by the nursery room French doors.

Following Lwaxana onto the balcony, Beverly wasn't that surprised to discover a bottle of burgundy and two glasses sitting on a table by two wrought iron antique chairs. Lwaxana settled into one chair, straightening out the full skirts to her rose suit about her legs. For Lwaxana, it was a surprisingly decorous outfit. Lwaxana noticed Beverly's critical, assessing glance. "I do know how to dress down on occasion," she teased. "Or, as my daughter would say, 'thank goodness'…"

Beverly busied herself with pouring some of the Picard wine into two red wine glasses. She eyed the label and the vintage. "You always seem to find the best vintage," she murmured almost to herself.

"It's just one of my many talents," Lwaxana agreed as she accepted a glass from Beverly. "So, what shall we toast to? The twins have already had enough good wishes today." She arched an eyebrow. "I know. Let's drink to sex."

Beverly arched her eyebrow.

Lwaxana blithely continued. "After all, if we didn't have sex, we wouldn't have twins, now would we. Not to mention nothing to do but read at night."

"I can't argue with that," Beverly agreed, as she drank half a glass of the richly flavored, deeply colored red wine. Then she poured herself some more of the wine. She had an inkling that it was going to become one of _those_ kind of conversations with Lwaxana. And she wasn't going to permit Lwaxana to drink the lion's share of this particular effort from the Picard vinery.

Lwaxana settled into her chair, took a few sips of her burgundy, appreciated the complex yet smooth liquid that flowed over her taste buds, glanced down at the ancient rose garden that was directly below the nursery balcony, duly noticed its multi-colored beauty, and then turned her inquisitive stare upon friend.

"So, how is it?"

Beverly chose to be obtuse. "How is what?"

Lwaxana forged ahead, ignoring Beverly's internal disquiet. "Your sex life after babies."

Beverly took another sip - a long one - of the Picard family burgundy.

Lwaxana persisted. "You haven't yet, have you?"

"You are almost as bad as Deanna." Beverly really wished that she could ignore the Betazed ambassadress, but she also knew that the lady would persist. She gazed some more at the roses for a few moments before she finally answered the lady. "Jean-Luc and I have had our moments." Beverly chose her words very carefully.

"Your pleasuring the man a couple of times on your knees in the shower is not the same as the two of you soaring into the sun and setting the sheets on fire," Lwaxana countered. "And yes, I do find it easier to sense Jean-Luc's passions than I do your appetites. Like I stated earlier - I'm multi-talented. Knowing when people are occupied in the sex act is one of my many talents." Lwaxana emptied her glass. "Jean-Luc may have been _an active participant_ in the shower this morning, but you weren't."

Beverly decided not to share that little bit of information about Lwaxana's talents with her husband. He already found married life to be a wee bit unsettling as it was. "We…"

"You mean _you…," _Lwaxana countered. "I can't help but sense what Jean-Luc really _wants._" She didn't have to elaborate. She knew that Beverly knew.

Beverly sighed and then put down her glass. "I know what Jean-Luc wants. I just don't want…"

"No matter." Lwaxana interrupted, airily waved a hand about. "I have the cure." She made that statement rather boldly.

Beverly raised both eyebrows. "Cure for what?"

"For what ails your libido."

She chose not to be affronted for there was no point to taking a moral high ground when it came to Lwaxana. Beverly had learned that Lwaxana blithely ignored such points of view. Besides, Beverly couldn't help but be a little curious. "Do tell."

"Tap into what you're sensing from your husband. You are still connected psychically. I can sense it. You can still somewhat, sense him. So, feed off of his desires."

"You don't think that I've tried that?" Beverly argued. "I know that Jean-Luc wants to hold me and reciprocate. He wants to make love to me. But I just don't want…"

Lwaxana analyzed the mixed emotions that she was sensing from her friend. "Oh, you're a silly one, Beverly Howard Crusher Picard."

"Oh?"

"If it doesn't bother your husband, why should it bother you?"

Beverly glanced down as her lace suit skirt. "This suit is two sizes larger than the rest of my closet, Lwaxana."

"So? It took you nine months to gain the weight, so why shouldn't you take nine months or more, to lose it? _If_ you even have to lose it? The husbands on Pollux IV celebrate how much weight their wives have gained during their pregnancy…"

Beverly cut the ambassadress off in mid-sentence. "In two weeks, I'm going to have to put on my admiral's uniform," Beverly complained. "And we all know how _unforgiving_ Starfleet uniforms can be."

Lwaxana laughed at this conceit. "Then, go do what Holt does. Some admirals can design their own uniforms. I'm sure that Holt will let you do it as well. Go to Holt's tailor. I guarantee you that that Bolian can work wonders. She'll make it look like you have lost weight instead of gained it, when you go back on duty. Getta's a true genius when it comes to camouflage…" She eyed Beverly, still in tune with the lady's emotions. "But your baby weight gain really isn't the reason as to why you don't want Jean-Luc touching you, is it?"

Beverly sighed, knowing that Lwaxana would discern the truth regardless of how hard she tried to disguise it from the Betazed. In some respects, Lwaxana was as dogged as her daughter. "I… am no longer perfect, Lwaxana… The woman of Jean-Luc's dreams…"

"Stuff and nonsense. You have always wanted to be perfect in Jean-Luc's eyes." Lwaxana's smile was a touch sympathetic though. "Don't you know that you already are, and always will be _perfect_, to your besotted husband? Jean-Luc truly believes that you are his one true, perfect love - and lover. He hasn't noticed your extra weight. I doubt if he ever will. Heavens, if Jean-Luc ever even did so, no doubt he'd only conclude that this meant that there was only more of you to love."

Beverly groaned at this observation. Everything that Lwaxana had stated was perfectly believable. _Though she might physically harm her husband if he ever said aloud the phrase about 'more of you to love'…_

Lwaxana leaned forward and clasped Beverly's trembling fingers. "Oh my dear, just try to let your husband's desire flow through you when he feels it. When he touches you. When he looks at you. And especially when he lusts after you." She glanced in the direction of the courtyard where masculine voices could be heard laughing and talking. "Believe me, my dear, like most men, Jean-Luc has his erotic thoughts quite frequently during the day. And they are always about you. No one else. So, let his desire become yours." She shook her head hard enough so that the shimmering flowers of her coral to fuchsia headdress trembled. "Do you think I am in the mood every time that Holt is?"

Beverly didn't really want to think about _that_ so she just nodded her head as if acquiescing to whatever it was that Lwaxana was saying.

"I just let my husband's desire become my own. It usually works." Lwaxana poured herself some more wine. "I share it."

"And if it doesn't?"

"If you love the man, does it really matter?"

Beverly slowly nodded, understanding what wisdom Lwaxana was trying to impart to her. "I just wish…"

"Once you have babies, you can never go back to what was before," Lwaxana wisely added. "Though it does help to get away from the babies, now and then." She watched as Beverly consumed the last of the burgundy. And then she too-innocently asked, "Aren't the admirals having some sort of conference on Risa soon?"

"It's so artificial and predictable there," Beverly darkly muttered. "It's hardly how I would define 'romantic'. Besides, I wasn't planning on attending."

Lwaxana tish-toshed Beverly's words. "Risa was romantic enough for your husband. Jean-Luc just loved it when you were there with him…"

"We were on our honeymoon.," Beverly patiently mentioned.

"That's why Jean-Luc just loved it," Lwaxana just had to explain. "You were there, with him. Though if you were alone together in a shuttle crashed on a Class H planet, he would probably have had the identical reaction…"

William Alexander cried interrupting the conversation.

Beverly automatically stood and went inside to see what it was that was disturbing her son, even as she was still considering the senior ambassadress from Betazed's advice.

"Jamaharon, anyone?" Lwaxana grinned to herself as she sensed Beverly's decision.

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

"Is there a reason as to why we are tramping through grape fields in the mud?" a petulant Q queried as he swatted aside a grape vine that dared to intrude into his personal space.

"This is a vine-yard," Admiral Jean-Luc Picard patiently enunciated, as he tried to nudge Q into keeping up with Captain Riker and the other guests who had never really toured a vineyard before. It did not take much for Q to try his temper. "Besides, it rained four days ago. Under this hot sun - there is no mud."

Q shook something off of his shoe. He considered the possible source to the dark clump of something that had adhered to his foot. And he disliked the possibilities intensely. "Animals!" He shuddered. "Shit and nonsense," Q complained. And then he snapped his fingers.

Jean-Luc Picard found himself in the unusual position of reclining on a fluffy white cloud, looking down several hundred meters through the mist onto his family's ancestral land. Little swirls of aerial moisture gracefully coiled with his every movement forming infinity patterns.

Knowing there really was no point in protesting his position when Q was in one of his moods, all the admiral patiently stated was, "Q." There was a wealth of meaning behind the utterance of that letter.

"I want to talk with you, Jean-Luc," Q snipped.

Jean-Luc Picard tried standing, and quickly discovered that there wasn't anything solid upon which to stand when it came to fluffy marshmallow clouds - especially when they started to cohere into five-clawed Chinese Imperial dragons.

Q amusedly eyed Jean-Luc's ungainly attempt at standing. "You're just a mere mortal. I forgot."

Jean-Luc was surprised by this somewhat back-handed compliment.

Q snapped his fingers again. This time, cushiony snowy dots formed. "Walk with me, Jean-Luc." The dots floated into a winding pathway of stepping stones between the larger clouds. Jean-Luc still hesitated. "Oh, don't be a spoil sport, Jean-Luc. Admit that you've always wanted to walk on air. Now's your chance. Besides, I'll catch you before I let you plunge to your death. I still have need of you."

For a moment Jean-Luc couldn't decide between thanking Q for letting him walk on air or to berate him for the possibility of plunging toward the earth without an anti-grav unit.

"Walk!" Q ordered again.

Shoving aside his reluctance, Jean-Luc rested his weight on his foot, stepping onto the first cloudy stone. The blob shook a little but it held his weight. Breathing a little easier, Jean-Luc took another few hesitant steps. It was a most interesting, unusual experience.

Q bounced over and floated next to Jean-Luc.

"What is there to discuss?" Jean-Luc queried as he began to learn how to time his steps in a rhythm that would match the way that the squiggly white stepping stones would wiggle up and down and then back and forth.

"A few things," Q admitted, as he watched with glee, Jean-Luc's attempt to master the art of cloud walking. "Just how well do you understand Wesley's condition?"

Surprised by the subject of this discussion, Jean-Luc paused and turned to face Q. "What about Wesley? And his _condition?_"

"The Traveler is convinced that Wesley is a _wunderkind_."

Jean-Luc didn't offer any comments on the _wunderkind_ aspect of Wesley's intellect. "You know the Traveler?"

Q nodded. "Once he started interfering with Wesley, I made it a point to look him up. Interesting fellow. But far too dedicated to the nobleness of his calling in his search of the universe for like minds…" Q shuddered at such a thought. "If he'd met any Q other than me with my fondness for humans, the Traveler would have quickly learned that if the Continuum can't control those 'special' minds, well then, we would squish 'em."

Jean-Luc took Q's statement under consideration. There were more important questions that he would ask at a later point during this conversation - if Q gave him such a chance. Wesley was his foremost concern at the moment. "His mother and I have tried not to treat Wesley as too rare a genius."

"You do Wesley no favor by seeking to suppress his talents."

"I have never tried to suppress…" Jean-Luc abruptly stopped talking, as he forced his temper into abeyance.

"You just want Wesley to be _normal _before he becomes _abnormal_," Q announced. Then Q did something to unsettle Jean-Luc's nerves. Q did a glissade into the nearest cloudbank and disappeared.

Jean-Luc looked around before Q suddenly appeared, standing right behind him. "That was fun. You should try it, Jean-Luc." And then Q firmly shoved Jean-Luc into the nearest cloud bank.

Tumbling forward and then sideward, the superintendent of the Academy found himself encompassed in dense mists which was almost like being in a San Franciscan fog at its worst. Landing on his knees on top of some sort of slightly substantial darker grey clump, he took a deep breath to steady himself, looked around but could not really discern anything of distinction, and then tried his best to regain his footing. Jean-Luc Picard was finding it difficult to stand when he couldn't really see exactly where to place his feet.

Q loomed next to him, somewhat enjoying himself at Jean-Luc's expense. "Still haven't quite got the hang of it, have you, _Johnny boy_?"

"Q, what is the point of this exercise?" Jean-Luc ignored Q's use of the nickname 'Johnny', for he knew that if he made an issue of it, Q would torment him with that nickname forever. And a day.

Q shoved Jean-Luc again, this time toward a padded grey leather settee that had suddenly materialized directly in front of the former starship captain.

Grabbing at a padded, rolled arm, Jean-Luc managed to pull himself onto the settee and into an upright sitting position. A second later a rather large mug of steaming liquid appeared directly in front of his nose. Sniffing, Jean-Luc deduced that the grey mist colored demi-porcelain mug contained Earl Grey tea. And deciding not to question Q's beneficence or the reasons behind it, he grabbed the stoneware mug, and took a sip to steady his nerves. Then he decided that this mug contained a most drinkable tea, and took another sip.

Q floated over to the settee and sat down even as a brandy snifter appeared. "Want some of your family's libation, _Johnny_?" Before Picard could even shake his head in denial, Q added, "Oh, you're in one of your 'have to keep your wits about you' snits. Haven't you learned from me by now that there are moments when one shouldn't keep your wits about you?"

Sorely tried, even though the tea was helping to remind him of his essential self, all Jean-Luc calmly stated again was, "Q!" He restrained himself from uttering an instinctual derogatory comment about Q's antics. And then he explained with a somewhat calmer voice, "I've had enough alcohol to drink today, Q. It was a long luncheon with many toasts. I'd like to stay reasonably sober for the rest of the afternoon, at least…"

As if nothing of significance had happened since the first mention of Wesley, Q continued onward with that thread of thought. "Wesley's never going to be a good starship captain, Jean-Luc. Not that he couldn't be…"

Jean-Luc took a deep breath before too-politely asking, "Meaning?"

"Wesley's destiny lies elsewhere. There are quite a few things that Wesley will accomplish in his life. Being a good starship captain ain't one of them."

"Revealing the future, Q?"

"Not really. I can't give you the details. _They won't let me_, here in Sector One."

Jean-Luc sipped some more tea and duly noted that the mug was refilling itself. "I am impressed that anyone can control you - or that you permit it," he somewhat acerbically observed. "It seems rather uncharacteristic of you."

"Even an all-powerful, omnipotent being has to bow to the ways of the head honchos of the universe now and then, Jean-Luc."

"I still don't see the point to this conversation."

"The Traveler is coming for Wesley. Let the boy go with him."

"Why?"

Q glared at Jean-Luc. "Maybe because it is what is best for Beverly's son?"

"Beverly won't like you telling her that."

"Beverly won't like a lot of what is going to happen to her in the future. But she will get over it."

"Meaning?"

"I can't tell you, _Johnny_."

Feeling as if talking to Q turned him into a hamster on a perpetual treadmill constantly in search of a real, substantive answer, Jean-Luc constrained his irritation with this member of the Continuum.

Suddenly, all the playfulness about the Q vanished. "Wesley has quite a destiny. You and his mother - even Riker! - have already taught him well enough so that the boy has a foundation upon which to do what he must do. Eventually, he'll return to be a Starfleet officer before moving on to much bigger and more important things. Stuff that Wesley will even _like_ doing, too." Q waggled an eyebrow. "You'll be along for the ride."

"I see."

Q knew that he didn't. "Don't worry, _Johnny_. Your stint as superintendent of the Academy is only a short blip on history's map. In a few years, you'll be doing what the universe has chosen for you to do a long to ago."

Only a slight, weary-sounding sigh passed over Jean-Luc's lips. It was the only outward sign of his chaotic emotions. Jean-Luc was getting very tired of all of Q's game playing.

Q spoke up before Jean-Luc could ask the question. "You're a born diplomat, Jean-Luc. That's what the universe needs you to be in order for things to go right in this dimension."

The annoyance in Jean-Luc's voice sliced through the atmosphere. "Am I correct in assuming that if the Q hadn't meddled with mankind, _there would be no reason for me to make things right_ in this dimension?"

"Tish tosh, _Johnny_. That's neither here nor there."

Jean-Luc suspected that he had it right when it came to the actions of the Q.

"And then there is Anna, of course."

Hiding the sudden fear that gripped his soul, as calmly as he could, the father asked, "Meaning?"

"Girl's more than a little genius, you know. Warpie there, sensed it even in the womb when he did his best to protect her. She's the universe's 'little darling', if you must know." Q sniffed. "I will nobly protect her as her fairy godfather, for as long as I am permitted…," Q mentally added, "…and as long as she will permit me…"

Jean-Luc ignored the bastardization of his son's nickname. For he knew, that in his own way, Q was trying to warn him about something.

"Meaning?"

"One day, you'll dance at her wedding. Up until then, let her trust in her own instincts. She'll be far better at it than you ever were with your own…"

Rigidly controlling himself now, Admiral Picard asked again, "Meaning?"

"Your daughter has a job to do. In fact, you may even enjoy helping her doing it." The best way that Jean-Luc Picard could describe the smile that crossed over Q's face was that it wasn't nice. "None of your children - including your stepson - will ever be called _mundane._ Rejoice in that fact, _Johnny_. Don't try to repress them. When history writes its ledgers, you'll just be known as their father…" Q just had to add, "And be glad of it, too."

"What more could a father ask?" He sipped his tea.

"You don't mind the possibility of being outshone by your children?"

Jean-Luc shrugged, and ignored Q's baiting. "Why were they chosen?"

"_The gods like you, Jean-Luc_. Hence, they are fond of your family as well - and your beauteous Beverly, too. And heaven help those that the gods do _like_. That's why I was sent to plague you. And to protect you."

"Who are these _gods?_ More Q?"

"Why _Johnny_, if I revealed that to you, you'd know everything about the universe. And that is something that no mere mortal is entitled to know…" Q drank some brandy, then pontificated, "…or _should_ know. Too dangerous if you do."

Jean-Luc abruptly stood, wondering if he could follow the path and walk his way down to Earth. Q was just tormenting him. And he was tired of it.

Q stayed his movements by grasping Jean-Luc's forearm. Q quietly explained, "I am not permitted to tell you too much, Jean-Luc. I truly wish that I could." He proffered the former captain a regretful smile. "But I felt, since we are friends…," When Jean-Luc did not protest this definition of their relationship, Q continued, "…I felt that I did have to warn you. Things will not always be as they seem." Jean-Luc refrained from rolling his eyes. Q looked off into the depths of the clouds as if seeing something that Johnny could not perceive before adding, "But you will survive it all, Jean-Luc. With Beverly. With all of your children. You will love and live with joy in your life." He shook his head as if regretting having to say his next words. "There will be sorrows, of course. That's the way of the universe. I can't prevent the sorrows - and I shouldn't even if I could. Yet, extraordinary things are to come to you, Jean-Luc. And you will revel in those times." His smile held more than a hint of mystery as he looked at his human friend. "I promise you - you and yours. You will abide, Jean-Luc Picard. You will abide."

The next second, Jean-Luc found himself standing on the flagstones of the courtyard. Q had disappeared, leaving behind an disturbed man whose clothes were still damp from the exposure to the clouds.

_ And he wondered what it really was that Q was trying to tell him… And whether he should worry… Or tell Beverly…_

**=/\= ='/\'= =/\=**

"Must you leave?" Jean-Luc did not want to ask this question. But for his children's sake, he would. He found himself glancing about the _bleu de roi_ guestroom that Guinan had used. Someone, long ago, had designated this room as the 'Chinese Dragon' room because of an overall red and gold Oriental Imperial Dragon motif. Focusing his thoughts, Jean-Luc admitted, "Q tried to tell me something this afternoon. About the future."

Guinan folded up another one of her multitude of brown hats, and stuffed it into a valise. She looked up and caught Jean-Luc's gaze, holding it as if she were trying to silently communicate something to him too. "I know. I had to chastise him for it."

"What could be so terrible to tell that you had to do so?"

"Not terrible, Jean-Luc. Not in the long run. But humans shouldn't guide their actions with foreknowledge of the future. That's how mistakes happen."

"And that's what you and the Q are trying to prevent?" He paused before he added, "Or correct?"

She nodded. "Something like that." She picked up a yellow cloak that Jean-Luc knew that he'd never even seen before. He didn't think that Andorian yellow was a color that Guinan should wear. She smiled as she sensed his opinion. She then stuffed the cloak into an open chest. "Live your life the way you see fit, Jean-Luc. You've been making a lot of the 'right' choices lately. If I - or Q - don't interfere, you'll keep on doing so."

"What about Wesley? Q said that the Traveler was coming for him. For what?"

"Let's just call it an advanced doctoral education in the finer points of temporal mechanics, and leave it at that."

"Beverly won't want to let her son go."

"You both will barely know that Wesley is gone after he goes. What is a few months to you in this time, can be a millennia to a temporal planes magister."

"Why must he go? For what purpose?"

"The Traveler needs an apprentice. Wesley has been chosen. And it is something that Wesley will wish to do especially once he glimpses the possibilities and the opportunities…" Guinan tried to close her trunk. "The only way that Wesley won't go with the Traveler is if you throw him into the brig." She motioned for Jean-Luc to sit on her trunk in order for her to lock it. Jean-Luc complied. His weight was enough to force the lid flush with the framework. "The best way for mankind to protect itself is for mankind to understand the workings of the universe. And Wesley is one of the members of mankind who will actually learn some of the details. Experience it." She shrugged her shoulders. Jean-Luc watched as her olive colored hat rippled back and forth. "Wesley and the twins - you're all just one baby step forward when it comes to the evolution of mankind."

"I don't wish for this, Guinan."

"I know. But there are times when the universe simply ignores what you want. This is one of them."

"What should I do? Won't I need your help to guide me?" Jean-Luc did not like having to admit his doubts to Guinan.

"Follow your heart, Jean-Luc. And then your head. Your instincts are sound. Listen to what they tell you." She came over and patted his chest, momentarily admiring how good he looked wearing a Venetian blue silk shirt. Beverly most certainly was improving this man's wardrobe. "Besides, it's not as if I am really going that far away. I have to help Will Riker for now, for a while. But if you need me, I'm only a call away."

"The twins are going to miss you." Jean-Luc was not above playing the 'sentiment' card when it came to the game of his life.

"Nice try. And if I were truly an evil person, when they grow up, I'd introduce your set of twins to all of my sets of twins…"

"I've always wanted to meet your children, Guinan."

"Someday you're going to regret that statement, Jean-Luc - especially after you've met them. I've had twenty-six husbands, by the way."

Jean-Luc choked out, "Twenty-six?"

"Those are only the ones that I care to remember." Guinan's smile was inscrutable, as if she were remembering more than a few of her former husbands.

He could only accept her words at face value. There were times when Jean-Luc was not quite sure what was reality and what was exaggeration when it came to Guinan.

"And thirty-two children," she added, as if to confound him. "Next time you try to pick out a birthday present for Beverly, remember how much I have to remember when it comes to memorializing birthdays and anniversaries..."

"I will miss you." It was a confession from his heart.

"And I will miss you, Jean-Luc Picard," Guinan agreed as she granted herself permission to become emotional too. She fondly gazed upon her favorite human. "We certainly have had a grand old time of it, haven't we, old friend?" She stepped closer to him brushing away a piece of fuzz off of his shoulder that he must have collected from one of her fanciful chapeaus. "So far."

"Yes, we have." He stepped closer to her, absentmindedly smoothing away a wrinkle from her collar.

"But don't think that those grand old times are over, _Johnny_. There's a lot more to come." Her smile was cryptic. "You've got your twins, now. They are going to lead you on a very, merry dance."

"I'm glad of that," the former captain of the _Enterprise_ agreed. "I wouldn't want to get too stodgy in my declining years." His gaze did not disguise his fondness for this woman. "And I would not care to imagine a future where you would not be in it."

"Ditto," she teased as she embraced him. For a second, old memories threatened to re-emerge - for both of them. She hugged him tight and then kissed his cheek. "Give Beverly a little more time to cope with being a new mother, and then overwhelm her with your still considerable Gallic charm," she advised her former lover as she let him go. "And if that doesn't work, grovel. Then dig out the brandy and pour your wife a stiff drink or three. Beverly has more inhibitions that you do - and that is saying something. But the good stuff will help her along if you're in the right mood too."

He somewhat accepted Guinan's advice when it came to Beverly. He knew that his wife was troubled by several matters as of late. Most important amongst these matters was Beverly's reluctance to become his lover again. For he did not want a wife who was only willing to accommodate him in a shower, but not let him love her in every sense. And he had yet to discuss any of it with Beverly due to her continuing reluctance.

But when it came to Guinan, Jean-Luc Picard wasn't quite willing to just simply let her go - not yet. For a second he gazed into her fathomless eyes and then he pulled her close again, to place a soft, platonic kiss upon her lips. "Take care, old friend." And then he gave her his best, devilish smile. "And promise me that your torment of Will Riker will be equal to what you did to me."

"I'll do something to Will Riker. That much I can promise you. But what I did to you was only for your benefit. Will Riker will not be quite so lucky."

His laughter was light as he reluctantly let her go. For Guinan had always been a touchstone in his life. He would miss her.

_**Author's Note:**_ _There is one chapter to go which I will be posting shortly. And that will pretty much end this part of the DE-TACHED saga of 'Life with Beverly'. Though I will be adding a new, short story called "Pleasures with Picard" in the near future. It's all about Beverly and Jean-Luc's return trip to Risa. Basically, it's a PWP. Though I am doing two versions - one that will be "M" rated and one that will be rated "K" that will be called "Pleasure with the Picards". _

_ I am basically trying to see if you all are receptive to the idea of two versions of a story on fan fic - one adult and one for a general audience._

_ Also, the next major series of stories in the future, will be a combination of "Life with Wesley" and "Life with Will"._

_ All of these DE-TACHED stories are sequential sequels to my novel based in a decidedly alternative universe called ATTACHED - just in case you haven't read about that novel yet. Or if you have not paid any attention to my before-story notes._

_ If you feel in the mood for more lost-weekend kind of works, try another P/C alternative universe set of novels called THE BEST LAID PLANS and THE SKY'S THE LIMIT. These are two long a/u novels that start with the destruction of the Enterprise D and forge onward through all the trials and tribulations that Jean-Luc and Beverly have to endure before they can have a life together._

_ Also, check out my other TNG stories and novellas. And if you're in the mood for something different, try my VOYAGER stories. They're not too long, but I would like to think that they are 'fun' reads._

_ So, thank you for your kind words. And please do try to post reviews since all writers need encouragement - or at least an opinion or two._

_ Live long and prosper._


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